Parsing JSON via javascript getting error: json.parse:unexpected character

I am trying to parse an API data that i receive via ajax. I have no control over the api json structure. When i try to parse it using this code i get this error:

json.parse:unexpected character

and no data output on divs.I spend past 2 days couldn't fix it. Could you guys tell me how to fix it.Thanks

data.html content:

"[\r\n  {\r\n    \"itemID\": \"1\",\r\n    \"itemTitle\": \"First\",\r\n    \"itemText\": \"first one\",\r\n    \"ThumbUrl\": \"http://somesite.com/1.jpg\",\r\n    \"itemContent\": null\r\n  },\r\n  {\r\n    \"itemID\": \"2\",\r\n    \"itemTitle\": \"Second\",\r\n    \"itemText\": \"  second one\",\r\n    \"ThumbUrl\": \"http://somesite/2.jpg\",\r\n    \"itemContent\": null\r\n  }\r\n]"

javascript:

  <html>
    <script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.12.4/jquery.min.js"></script>
<script>
function ajax() {

$.get("./data.html", function(data){   

data = data.replace("\"[", "["); 
data = data.replace("]\"", "]"); 
$("#area1").text(data);

// parse JSON response
var json = $.parseJSON(data);

console.log(json);

    // then loop the single items
    for(i in json)
    {
       // create HTML code
       var div = "<div class=\"image\">\n" + 
       "<a href=\"javascript:dofunction('./test.php?title=" + json[i].itemTitle + "&TargetUrl=http://somesite.com/" + json[i].itemID + "')\">\n" +
       "<img src=\""+ json[i].ThumbUrl +"\" alt=\"..\" />\n" +
       "</a>\n" +
       "</div>\n";

      $("#myDiv").append(div);
    }
});

}
</script>

<body>
<button onclick="ajax()">test</button>
<br>orginal data:<br>
<textarea id="area1" rows="4" cols="50" ></textarea>
<div id='myDiv'></div>
</html>

console.log(json):

JSON.parse: unexpected character
https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.12.4/jquery.min.js
Line 4

Solution

Finally I solved the problem by removing both quotations,\r\n and some other unnecessary things with following method:

data = data.replace("\"[", "["); 
data = data.replace("]\"", "]");


data = data.replace(/\\r\\n/g, ""); 
data = data.replace(/\\/g, "");

data = data.replace("n\"", ""); 
data = data.replace("\")", ""); 
data = data.replace("\",", "");