More James Brown drama
Daughter arraigned in knife attack against husband; couple in midst of divorce case.
Yamma Brown Lumar was arraigned last week in Fulton County on a felony charge of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon for the March 9 attack at the couple’s Tuxedo Court home in Buckhead.
Atlanta police noticed blood spatters on the home’s floor. Darren Lumar told investigators the couple had argued and struggled when she broke free, went to the kitchen to get the knife and then stabbed him in the right forearm as he tried to restrain her, according to the police report.
He got 12 stitches.
“She was going for my chest,” he said in a Tuesday interview. “I have no doubt that woman was trying to kill me.
“This is a crazy case,” he said. “At the time I thought we were happily married. But I guess she wanted out, and she figured by killing me she gets out.”
Yamma Lumar told police she struck in self-defense after he punched her in the nose and had thrown her to the marble floor. Police noted, “Mrs. Lumar did not have any physical injuries, only complaints.” The report added that there was slight swelling at the bridge of her nose. Both had been drinking.
Darren Lumar, a 36-year-old who said he’s involved in investment banking, said, “We were dealing with a lot of family stress at the time. ”
He was initially charged with simple battery but those charges were later dropped. Yamma Lumar, a pharmacist who is 34, was initially charged with aggravated assault and indicted on those charges in April. Yamma Lumar’s attorney did not respond to a request for comment Tuesday.
In an unrelated case, Darren Lumar faces three pending charges of misdemeanor sexual battery filed last year in Fulton County. A former employee of his, Jasmine Palmer, last year told WSB-TV: “He’ll make his advances toward me, grope me and touch on me, and I tried to not say anything and tried to just brush it off, but it was just getting overbearing. Then he got me cornered up in a room, basically, and forced himself on me.”
In the other case, Yamma Lumar was not arrested the night of the attack, but she was asked to leave the home that night, the report states.
“They were going to take her to jail,” Darren Lumar said. “I begged them not to take her to jail. She was going to miss her father’s funeral.”
The next day, he said he traveled to his father-in-law’s burial in South Carolina at the property of another of Brown’s daughters, Deanna Brown Thomas. But Lumar said he was not allowed to attend the service. However, he said he visited James Brown’s grave after the burial, which is said to be temporary.
Brown, who was 73, died on Christmas Day of heart failure at Atlanta’s Crawford Long Hospital, but he was not buried for two and a half months. The family and Tomi Rae Hynie, Brown’s companion who bore a child she said was his son, split over the division of the assets and even where the body should be buried. That case is still working itself through the court system.
The Lumars are in the midst of divorce proceedings.
Randy Kessler, Darren Lumar’s divorce lawyer, said the stabbing will be “crucial” in the ongoing custody battle over the couple’s two children. The two sides are to appear in Fulton County court on Wednesday.
“The stability of the parents and the safety of the kids is crucial,” Kessler said. “It comes down to judgment.”
Outlaw, Yamma Lumar’s attorney, said of Darren Lumar: “It’s not appropriate to threaten criminal prosecution to get advantage in a civil proceeding.”