Mother slits son’s throat after 3-day Disneyland trip, calmly surrenders to police with blood still on hands

Warning: The article contains details of the murder of a child. Please proceed with caution.

It is like an unwritten law — a mother would cross volcanoes, swim across oceans, and bear any misfortune to protect her child. But sometimes, that love fails horribly, unable to trump an individual’s selfishness — a fate that befell an 11-year-old boy in California after his mother murdered him in cold blood. The more soul-chilling part? She calmly walked to the police, appearing unbothered, as if she hadn’t just slit the throat of the child she gave birth to.

The young boy was found at the La Quinta Inn & Suites in Santa Ana, Calif., on March 19, 2025, allegedly after the mother, 48-year-old Saritha Ramaraju, dialed 911 to inform the police that she had murdered her son, whose custody she was actively seeking, and taken pills to commit suicide, as per the Orange County District Attorney’s Office’s statement.

Ramaraju had moved out of California after she and her husband divorced in 2018. Her son was with her as part of the custody visitation, and the two had just completed a three-day Disneyland trip. Upon arriving on the scene, his body was found amid his Disneyland souvenirs. The day his mother stabbed him to death was the very day he was supposed to return to his father.

“The life of a child should not hang in the balance between two parents whose anger for each other outweighs their love for their child. Anger makes you forget who you love and what you are responsible for doing. The safest place for a child should be in their parents’ arms. Instead of wrapping her arms around their son in love, she slit his throat and in the cruelest twist of fate removed him from the very world she brought him into.”

– Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer

But perhaps the most terrifying aspect of this tragic case is how calm Ramaraju appeared at the time of her arrest. In the bodycam footage of her arrest, she is seen casually walking toward the officers while talking to someone on the phone. As she was handcuffed, one of the officers noticed that she had “blood on her hands.”

Post her arrest, based on her initial statement, she was taken to the hospital for taking an unknown substance. As for the charges against her, she was initially facing the charge of one count of murder. But as shared by the DA with People, they are aiming to upgrade the charges, which could result in a death penalty for Ramaraju since it was allegedly a pre-planned murder where she purchased the large kitchen knife in advance and waited for a considerable time before killing her son. 

If you or someone you know may be considering suicide, contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 (En Español: 1-888-628-9454; Deaf and Hard of Hearing: 1-800-799-4889) or the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741. A list of international crisis resources can be found here.