Charges: Teen halts knife attack on his mother by her husband, is fatally stabbed in Austin home

A teenage boy halted a knife attack on his mother by her husband only to end up being fatally stabbed by the man in the family's Austin, Minn., home, according to murder charges.

Jaime A. Vaca, 27, was charged Wednesday in Mower County District Court with second-degree murder and first-degree assault in connection with the killing of the boy and the wounding of his 35-year-old mother on Tuesday at the home in the 800 block of NW. 3rd Avenue.

Vaca remains jailed in lieu of $500,000 bail ahead of a court appearance Friday. A message was left with his attorney seeking a response to the allegations.

Austin Police Chief David McKichan said in a Facebook post that the violence prompted "one of the most challenging and tragic calls I can recall in our city's history. … Arriving officers and deputies found a scene in which they needed to provide immediate medical aid to two victims for severe wounds, secure a suspect using nonlethal means if possible, and protect yet unharmed individuals in the home — all of whom were children."

Authorities have yet to release the identities of the woman or the son. The family identified the teen as 15-year-old Julio Cesar Rodriguez.

However, Mayo emergency medical dispatch disclosed that all the other children younger then Rodriquez and the mother is 35.

According to the complaint, officers found the woman outside bleeding from a stab wound to the neck and her son bleeding on a couch. Emergency responders got him to a hospital in Rochester, where he died.

Vaca was hiding in a bathroom holding a knife. He refused to drop the knife and was subdued with a Taser. The officers also found five children hiding upstairs.

Vaca and his wife were arguing in their bedroom, and one of the children summoned the son for help. The son kicked in the bedroom door as Vaca was on top of the boy's mother, choking her. Vaca got off his wife when the son intervened. He grabbed a knife and stabbed the boy.

Vaca told detectives that he and his wife were arguing about his new job, which he quit the night before. He admitted stabbing the boy before he went upstairs and kissed the other children, all younger than the boy killed, goodbye because he intended to kill himself, he said. When a detective told Vaca that the boy had died, he replied, "I'm a murderer," and dropped his head.