Home Fire; Mom Charged Blood and lighter fluid stained Tanicia Goodwin's clothes and slash wounds marked her neck when she walked to a police station, smashed a display case in the lobby and collapsed to the floor. Minutes earlier, Goodwin had slashed both her children's throats, soaked them with lighter fluid and set their Salem apartment on fire, prosecutors and emergency officials said. But Goodwin didn't initially tell police much Sunday night. I did what I had to do to protect my children. I'm sorry," Goodwin kept repeating to a police interviewer, according to authorities. Her 8-year-old son, Jamaal, was more specific after a firefighter found him, though he couldn't talk and was struggling to breathe. "The paramedic asked if his mother did this to him, and he nodded yes," prosecutor Melissa Woodard said at Salem District Court on Monday. A firefighter found Jamaal sitting by a door in the burning apartment, and his 3-year-old sister, Erica, was left face down and bleeding in a nearby unit, Salem fire Chief David Cody said. Jamaal was in critical condition on Monday and Erica was in stable condition after they underwent surgery at Children's Hospital in Boston, officials said. Goodwin, 25, was ordered held without bail and scheduled to appear in court next week. A judge will then decide if she's eligible for bail on charges including two counts of assault with intent to murder and arson. Tanicia Goodwin is arraigned in Salem District Court on 2 counts of armed assault with intent to murder, 2 counts of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and 1 count of arson on Monday, March 19, 2012 in Salem, Mass. Goodwin is accused of slashing the throats of her 8-year-old son and 3-year-old daughter and deliberately setting her apartment on fire on Sunday, March 18, 2012. Goodwin, 25, was ordered held without bail pending an appearance in court next week. (AP Photo/The Boston Globe, Aram Boghosian, Pool) Close Goodwin pleaded not guilty. Her court-appointed attorney, Steven Van Dyke, didn't immediately return a call seeking comment Monday. No motive was disclosed by the prosecutor or Goodwin's lawyer. Later Monday, several residents outside the building where Goodwin lived at the high-rise Salem Heights Apartments declined to comment. The door to Goodwin's building was locked to non-residents. Prosecutors said Goodwin not only set the fire but also disabled the apartment's smoke alarms, removed the interior doorknob and blocked the vents and nearly every sprinkler with duct tape. Almost everyone has asked that same question: 'What went through her mind?' Cody said. Firefighters responded to the blaze Sunday night and saw Goodwin and her daughter with two other adults in a neighbor's apartment. But they didn't notice the girl was wounded as they headed to the fire in Goodwin's apartment, Cody said. He said Lt. Richard Arno used a hallway extinguisher to knock down the fire enough to get a look around. Soon after, he found Jamaal sitting against a wall with a neck wound so severe his trachea was exposed. Arno carried the boy out, and firefighters put out what turned out to be a minor blaze. Firefighters then checked the floor to make sure everyone had left and found Erica had been abandoned on a couch in the neighboring apartment, Cody said. "It was basically just going back and checking everything, and they just happened on the girl," he said. Prosecutors said nurses had to wipe lighter fluid off both children before they could be treated. Three cans of lighter fluid were found around the apartment, as well as a large kitchen knife, which police believe was the weapon Goodwin used, prosecutors said. After leaving her apartment building, Goodwin apparently walked to the police station, about a mile away. While she was being interviewed, Goodwin asked for a cigarette, but police wouldn't give her one because she also had lighter fluid on her clothes, authorities said.