A Blaine woman who fatally stabbed her boyfriend last summer after he knocked out her tooth pleaded guilty Tuesday to first-degree manslaughter.
Arteisha Love, 31, will be sentenced on May 10 at the Anoka County District Court.
Public defender Joann Anton, Love's attorney, said her client agreed to a six-year sentence to the Minnesota Correctional Facility for Women in Shakopee.
On June 1, 2015, Love told police that Gregory Stallone Stewart, 29, showed up to her apartment drunk. They got into a fight and he knocked out her front tooth.
Police interviewed Love's young daughter, who witnessed the stabbing, and told them that she saw the couple shoving each other and her mother's tooth on the floor. The girl said her mother walked from the living room to the kitchen, came back to the living room with a knife and stabbed Stewart.
Love waited nearly an hour before her brother called 911. She had her daughter mop up the blood and throw away the knife.
Initially, Love denied any involvement, but later told police that she "didn't mean to do it." She said her relationship with Stewart was abusive.
In an eight-month period between October 2014 and June 2015, there were at least seven police calls made in Blaine and West St. Paul regarding Love and Stewart. Four of those calls resulted in police sending Stewart to detox centers. In 2014, Stewart was convicted of domestic assault and of felony violating an order of protection.
Anton said she was "appalled" that Love was charged in the first place.
"She defends herself, and she's charged," Anton said. "It's exasperating. She is clearly the definition of a battered woman."
Karen Zamora • 612-673-4647
Twitter: @KarenAnelZamora
