NORTH MIAMI BEACH, Fla. – A North Miami Beach man was arrested Monday after police said he stabbed his wife to death in their home.
Clieve Lake Jr., 40, faces charges of second-degree murder, domestic violence and child abuse.
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According to the arrest report, Lake, his wife, Rosalinda Emerick, and a friend were using drugs together early Monday at the couple's home in the 1600 block of Northeast 160th Street when the Lake and Emerick began arguing about an unpaid bill.
The pair then went to a bedroom while the friend stayed in the living room and continued doing drugs, the report said. The couple's 2-month-old son was in the home at the time, the report said.
The friend said she heard Lake raise his voice and Emerick make a muffled sound, the report said. When the friend went to the bedroom door to tell the couple that she was leaving, she saw Lake holding a knife and Emerick bound in clear tape and lying naked on the floor, the report said. She told police that what she saw gave her "a sick feeling in her stomach" and she left the house.
According to the report, Lake followed the woman as she got into her car while still holding the knife. Police said Lake then left the house for several hours, leaving his infant son alone in a car seat inside the house.
The report said, sometime later around 6:30 a.m., Lake knocked on his neighbor's door holding his son and told them his wife was dead.
Lake muttered, "It was the drugs. It was the drugs," while the neighbor went to check on Emerick, prosecutors said.
Police and paramedics were called and pronounced Emerick, 25, dead at the scene.
Lake told officers that the couple's friend had bound and stabbed his wife while he rolled cigars in the living room, prosecutors said.
Lake is currently being held on $150,000 bond at Miami-Dade County's Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center.