MILWAUKEE — Arzel Ivery, the 26-year-old Milwaukee man accusedof killing a mother and her two daughters, pleaded guilty to homicide charges Friday.
Online court records show Ivery pleaded guilty to three counts of 1st-degree intentional homicide. His sentencing hearing is scheduled for July 16, 2021.
Ivery was extradited back to Wisconsin from Memphis in February of 2020, where he was arrested in connection to the murders.
Amarah Banks, 26, and her two daughters, Zaniya Ivery, 5, and Cameria Banks, 4, had been missing for at least a week before investigators found their bodies in a garage near 47th and Burleigh.
According to a criminal complaint, Ivery's father initially called the Memphis Police Department and stated that Ivery had killed the mother of his children and his children in Milwaukee earlier in the month.
In police interviews, Ivery said there had been tension between him and Amarah Banks since the recent death of their son on Feb. 7, 2020. He admitted to going to her house on Feb. 8 during which time the two got into an argument and Ivery eventually strangled her to death.
Ivery told police he did not want the children to "live in a world where they did not have their mother," so he went into each child's bedroom and strangled them as well, according to the criminal complaint.
