CHESTERFIELD COUNTY, Va. -- The greater Chesterfield community is remembering the lives of a mother and her three children who were slain less than two weeks ago in their Chester home.
JoAnna Cottle, her 13-year-old daughter, Kaelyn Parson and 4-year-old twins Kinsey and Jayson Cottle were shot and killed on the morning of November 18. On Tuesday, a funeral service was held for the four at Destination Church in Hopewell.
"She was an amazing woman, loved everyone," said Bobbi Ivey, JoAnna Cottle's sister.
Ivey said her sister was known as "Momma Bear" throughout the family for her protective nature.
"She was a protector," Ivey said. "She protected those children."
Kaelyn was said to be a talented artist who loved to draw and had a compassionate heart for her teachers and peers at school.
"There's a lot of firsts that I associate with Kaelyn," her uncle, Calvin Brown, said during the service. "But my biggest first is, it was my first time seeing hope and love personified."
The Cottle twins were described as "inseparable" and "fireworks wherever they went."
"The twins, the babies, they were so full of life and so happy," Ivey said.
The shooting suspect, 35-year-old Navy veteran Jonah Adams, is Cottle's former boyfriend. Officials say he is the father of the twins. Adams was arrested in Maryland, where he is being held without bond. He is now facing four counts of first-degree murder.
Crime Insider sources say Adams came to the family's home around 4 a.m. that Friday morning. That's when sources said Cottle called 911 after she saw him outside the home wearing a type of camouflage mask. Officers said JoAnna Cottle had previously filed a protective order, but it was denied by a judge.
Now, the family continues to ask why the four were taken so soon.
"We don't have most of those answers, but our family trusts in God," said Jeff Morton, JoAnna's brother.
JoAnna Cottle's cousin, Stephen Bradshaw, said throughout the tragedy, the family has received an outpouring of support, from first responders in the county, to staff with Chesterfield County Public Schools. He said he wants the victims to be remembered for who they were, more so than how they were taken.
"In a tragedy like this, there's always something good that comes from it. Even though it is a hard time for the families, we want their stories told the way we remember them," Bradshaw said.
