The case of a Cary woman and her daughter found dead 13-months ago from multiple stab wounds and slashings is now being investigated as murder-suicide, officials confirmed Friday.

The bodies of Karitha Carroll, 31, and her 3-year-old daughter, Jamaya Carroll, were discovered Sept. 23, 2009, in their home on U.S. 61 in Sharkey County.

Authorities had investigated the slayings as a double homicide, but Sharkey County Chief Deputy Stanley Coleman confirmed Friday that sheriff’s investigators along with agents from the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation now believe Karitha Carroll might have slashed the toddler’s throat before inflicting stab and slash wounds on herself.

It was the second development this week in the year-old case which has seen investigators collect and test DNA from a large number of family, friends and associates of Karitha Carroll as well as search out persons of interest.

Tuesday, Karitha Carroll’s uncle, Tony Stamps, 41, was arrested in Vicksburg and charged with obstruction of justice and tampering with evidence.

Stamps had reportedly discovered the bodies when he went to find out why his niece hadn’t reported for work or responded to calls and text messages from family and co-workers.

Sharkey County Sheriff Lindsey Adams said Stamps, who moved to Arizona shortly after his niece’s death but had returned to Mississippi recently, turned himself in to authorities after they contacted him by phone.

Stamps was released on $5,000 bond Thursday after an initial hearing before Justice Court Judge Treves Cooper at the Sharkey County Courthouse, Coleman said.

Authorities said Stamps found Karitha Carroll on a bedroom floor with multiple stab wounds to her chest. Jamaya was found in a bed with multiple slash wounds to her neck.

Sharkey County Coroner Angelia Eason said the two had been dead about 12 hours when Stamps found them.

Eason said the mother also suffered defensive wounds on her arms and slash wounds to her throat. “All of her wounds were in the front,” Eason said. “Either she was fighting or trying to stop someone from cutting her.”

But Adams said the day after the deaths that investigators found very few signs of struggle in the home. A lamp was on the floor next to Carroll’s body, and officials theorized that Carroll’s attacker was someone she knew because she and her daughter were killed in a bedroom rather than the living room, Adams said.

Friday, Coleman would not comment on how her wounds could be consistent with suicide, or how officials believe Stamps interfered with the investigation.

“At this point we are not releasing any other comments,” Coleman said.

District Attorney Ricky Smith said he had met with Sharkey County officials and MBI agents during the course of the investigation, but could not comment on their findings.