Washington, DC: D.C. man charged with murder in wife's death Suspect threatened to kill victim in July, prosecutors say

By Keith L. Alexander
Thursday, November 19, 2009
A Northeast Washington man has been ordered held without bond, accused of using a vase to beat his wife to death Sunday, four months after prosecutors said he had threatened to kill her.

Kenneth L. Ross, 52, wearing a white prison jumpsuit and booties, stood before D.C. Superior Court Magistrate Judge Joseph E. Beshouri on Tuesday as a federal prosecutor described the bloody scene and evidence in the case.

According to charging documents, Ross's wife, Rosa May Fludd-Ross, 55, was found Sunday on the living room floor in her home in the 3100 block of 35th Street NE. She had been beaten, and an autopsy showed that she might have been dead since Friday or Saturday.

The owner of the home, George McKoy, was also found beaten. He was in critical condition Wednesday at a local hospital.

Blood was splattered on the living and dining room walls and ceilings, according to the documents. The living room furniture, including the coffee table, was covered in blood. The phone cord in the living room looked as if it had been pulled from the wall jack, the documents say.

Police said that Ross was picked up Monday and that he initially denied being married. But then he said he was separated. He finally told police that he and Fludd-Ross had argued at the house and that he struck her with a vase, the papers say. Ross said that McKoy tried to break up the argument and that he pushed McKoy, the documents say.

Ross was also arrested in July, accused of threatening to kill his wife and yanking the phone from her as she tried to call police.



In another case, he pleaded guilty to simple assault after police responded to a 911 call for domestic abuse at the house on 35th Street. At the time, Fludd-Ross told police that "he's trying to kill me so, I ran out of the back door."

Assistant U.S. Attorney Charles Cobb said Tuesday that Ross was guilty of premeditated first-degree murder because he had threatened his wife months before the slaying.

Ross's attorney, Ronald Horton of the District's Public Defender Service, said there was no evidence that Ross planned to kill his wife before what he described as a "brief scuffle" among his client, his client's wife and McKoy.

Beshouri reduced the charge to second-degree murder and ordered Ross to be held at the D.C. jail until a hearing Nov. 30.