WORCESTER — A city man walked into the Worcester Police Department yesterday and told police he had murdered his wife and wanted to turn himself in, authorities said.
Natalio Felix, 39, entered the station at 9 a.m. and told police they could find his wife’s body in their Huntingdon Avenue home.
Police went to the house and found the man’s wife, Janice Santos, 39, in a bedroom on the home’s second floor, authorities said. She was pronounced dead at 10:08 a.m. at UMass Memorial Medical Center University Campus.
The cause of death is pending the results of an autopsy, police said in a press release.
Felix has been charged with murder. Police said he is at a local hospital for an undisclosed injury, and will be arraigned in Worcester Central Court when he is released from the hospital.
Felix was interviewed by detectives during the day, and investigators with a search warrant collected evidence from the house.
Santos is the mother of three children and had worked for the past three years as the supervisor of support staff in the Worcester Superior Court Probation Department.
She had previously worked in similar positions in Westborough District Court and Dudley District Court.
“She was a very intelligent, personable individual. It’s a devastating loss to this department,’’ said her boss, chief probation officer Thomas A. Turco III.
Turco said he met Santos in the mid-1990s, when both worked in the Westborough court.
“Such a waste of a young life and a beautiful mother. My heart goes out to those kids. She was a dedicated mother, as well as a dedicated employee,’’ he said.
Linda Mastro, operations supervisor at the Westborough courthouse, also worked with Santos.
“It’s a terrible thing,’’ she said. “She was a wonderful girl, beautiful. We kept telling her she should be a model.’’
Mastro said Santos stayed in touch with her by e-mail when she left the Westborough job. In the years they had known each other, Santos never mentioned any abuse at home, Mastro said.
Santos sometimes brought her young children when she visited her former co-workers in Westborough. She was the kind of person who remembered to send flowers or a card when a friend was going through an illness or a loss in the family, Mastro recalled.
Felix and Santos were married Jan. 5, 2000, and a year later bought a house in a residential neighborhood off West Boylston Street, according to city and state records.
A neighbor, John Lamacchia, walked down the quiet street yesterday after his son called him to tell him the news.
“I’m in shock. It’s a very nice neighborhood,’’ Lamacchia said.
“I just feel really bad for everyone involved. I feel really bad for her,’’ he said.
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