The man believed to have slit the throat of 18-year-old Nia Wilson at an Oakland BART station on Sunday night was arrested without incident Monday night.
Police apprehended 27-year-old John Lee Cowell, a paroled felon, on a BART train nearly 24 hours after he allegedly attacked sisters Nia and Letifah Wilson in a vicious stabbing at the MacArthur station in Oakland. An anonymous caller had tipped police that Cowell had boarded an Antioch-bound train,
reports the San Francisco Gate.
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In a news conference Monday afternoon, BART Police Chief Carlos Rojas referred to the deadly stabbing as a “prison-style attack” that was among “the most vicious” he had ever seen in 30 years of policing.
Letifah Wilson, 26, who was also stabbed in the neck but survived the assault, described Cowell’s demeanor immediately following the attack to ABC 7 News.
“I looked back, and he was wiping off his knife and stood at the stairs and just looked — and from there on, I was just caring for my sister. I was in shock. ... I didn’t know I was cut because I was paying more attention to my sister. But he just stood there, like it was nothing.”
As the Washington Post reports, the Wilson sisters didn’t normally ride the BART train, but opted to take it that night on the way home from a family gathering.
Wilson’s mother, Alicia Grayson, told the East Bay Times that Nia didn’t like the BART.
“She was scared of the BART,” Grayson said through tears. “Now I see why.”
Protesters rallied to pay tribute to Nia and to demand justice for her senseless, violent death. The racial dynamic of the killing—Cowell, a young white man, selecting two young black women to prey upon—wasn’t missed by many.
Singer and Oakland native Kehlani spoke passionately about the attack on social media, criticizing BART officials for not acting sooner to catch Cowell and referring to him as a “white supremacist.”
) Only there was a vigil which turned into a rally in that area and I heard the white supremacists never showed up. 
Outside your residence?
