A teacher was stabbed to death right in front of her students in Long Beach on Friday afternoon, police said.

Kellye Taylor, 53, was the second oldest of five sisters. Her close-knit family is devastated by her murder.

Taylor was a teacher at Huntington Academy, a small elementary school in Long Beach owned by her mother.

53-year-old Kellye Taylor, a mother of three and a teacher at the Huntington Academy School, a small, private elementary school.

‘She loved children, and she loved being around children. She loved teaching children, and that’s what she did,’ said Vanessa Kelly, the victim’s sister.

Police say Taylor was sitting in a park across the street from the school around 1:30 p.m. watching her students play when a man suddenly walked up and stabbed her in front of the children.

‘She was sitting inside of a folding chair, just inside of that concrete bench, when the suspect came up from behind and stabbed her,’ said Sgt. Aaron Eaton with the Long Beach Police Department.

When officers arrived, they found an adult female with a stab wound to the upper body.

Witnesses pointed out the suspect and police captured him a few blocks from the park. He has been identified as 50-year-old Steven Brown.

Police said Brown was the father of Taylor’s grandchildren.

Loved children: Kellye taught Kindergarten through Sixth Grade. She was killed in Orizaba Park in Long Beach in front of her students

‘The suspect did not at any time try to approach the children, attack them or do anything with them,’ said Eaton.

Family members say Taylor had custody of the four grandchildren from her daughter’s relationship with Brown. Relatives say they want justice for Taylor.

‘I don’t know why he did what he did,’ said Kelly.

Long Beach police say the motive for the murder remains under investigation.

Brutal: Kellye Taylor, 53, was sitting in this chair in Orizaba Park across the street from the school watching her students play when a man approached her and stabbed her in the neck

Arrest: Long Beach police spokesman Aaron Eaton said Steven Brown, 50, of Long Beach had been arrested in the stabbing death. Eaton said the victim is the grandmother to Brown’s children

Read more: Daily Mail