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PALMDALE (CNS) - A kidnapping suspect who sheriff's deputies say is armed and barricaded inside an apartment in Palmdale with her baby live-streamed her ordeal for nearly 12 hours today as crisis negotiators continued to persuade her to surrender.
Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department deputies and Special Enforcement Bureau personnel responded at about 5:10 p.m. Wednesday to an apartment building in the 38000 block of Fifth Street East where a man and a woman wanted for kidnapping barricaded themselves in a second-story unit, according to Deputy Juanita Navarro-Suarez of the Sheriff's Information Bureau.
CBS2 reported at about 6:15 p.m. that the man had been taken into custody and was being questioned by sheriff's detectives. The female suspect remained in the apartment and could be seen holding a baby as she stepped onto the unit's balcony.
Navarro-Suarez said surrounding apartments were evacuated out of an abundance of caution.
Dressed in a dark blue hoodie and black leggings with “Ghostbusters'' images, the woman seemed defiant as she told friends and others via live-stream that she did not receive a “fair trial'' and had no plans to surrender. “The only way that I leave here is with ... the coroner,'' she said, crying on and off. “I will not leave here in handcuffs.''
The live-stream ended after 1 a.m. Authorities cut off power to the apartment early Thursday morning, according to Fox 11 TV reports.
The woman, periodically cradling a young child in her arms, said she had been to court on unspecified charges and said the court system had failed her and her family. “I don't have family,'' she lamented. “If I had family they would be here with me.''
It was not immediately know if she has lost custody of her children.
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