UPDATE: Michael L. Brea has been charged with 2nd degree murder and criminal possession of a weapon, according to TMZ. Arraignment is scheduled for later today.


'Ugly Betty' and 'Step Up 3D' actor Michael L. Brea allegedly butchered his mother to death with a sword as he chased her around his Brooklyn, New York apartment while reciting biblical passages in the wee hours of Tuesday morning.

Reportedly, neighbors called NYPD when they heard bloodcurdling screams coming from Brea's apartment. "I hear the brother chasing her [his mother] through the house and he's just saying a bunch of [Bible] passages like, 'Repent, Repent, Repent,'" neighbor Gregory Clare told local WPIX, a local television news outlet. "I heard him chasing her through the house and I hear a loud scream and so I have my father call the cops, call 911."

When police arrived at murder scene, they found Yannick, the small-time actor's 55-year-old World Trade Center survivor mother, in a blood-splattered bathroom, decapitated and in a kneeling position, her body had been mutilated by multiple stabbings. Investigators describe the residence as pure bloody gore.

Brea was found sitting on a bed with the three-foot ceremonial sword he had removed only one day before without permission from a Masonic lodge after a meeting. The 31-year-old low level mason was still spouting gibberish and talking about repentance when police tasered, then removed him from the apartment on a stretcher. Brea, who is a twin, Haitian-American and who also starred in a campaign for the energy drink Full Throttle was taken to nearby Kings County Hospital for psychiatric observation.

Brea's cousin John who stood outside the apartment building as police took his relative away told the New York Daily News that his aunt was a very loving and hard working caregiver.

A stunned ex-girlfriend described Brea as a martial arts aficionado who never displayed any signs whatsoever of mental imbalance or violence. She told the New York Daily News, "Michael had the whole world in his hands. This is a shock."