Spring Hill woman gets house arrest in fatal stabbing of boyfriend

A Spring Hill woman who stabbed her live-in boyfriend to death was ordered to serve two years of house arrest after she pleaded guilty Monday to voluntary manslaughter.

Desiree Holston, 31, will also serve six years of probation as part of a plea agreement with the Allegheny County District Attorney’s Office.

She entered the plea before Common Pleas Judge Elliot Howsie.

A criminal complaint filed in the case said police were called to the couple’s apartment on Buente Street around 1:40 a.m. Nov. 1, 2020, for a man who had been stabbed.

Derrick Stanford, 31, was found in the living room with a single stab wound to the chest.

He died a short time later at Allegheny General Hospital.

Pittsburgh police said Holston told them that around 7 p.m. the evening before, Stanford, who she lived with, had returned home and they started to argue.

“Ms. Holston said during the argument, the victim grabbed her by the neck and started to choke her,” police said.

Holston said she called for her brother, who was in the next room, and he told Stanford to leave her alone.

Holston told police she went to the kitchen, retrieved a knife and went back into her bedroom.

The complaint said Holston told police that Stanford continued to argue with her and lunged at her. She stabbed him once in the chest and called 911, the complaint said.