A woman suspected of killing her three children in Los Angeles said she did so to protect them from abuse.
Liliana Carrillo, 30, on Thursday granted a prison interview with NBC branch KGET in Bakersfield, California, where she is being held after being arrested on the grounds of the carjacker the day her children’s bodies were discovered by their grandmother. .
The children, Joanna, 3; Terry, 2; and Sierra, 6 months old, were found in an apartment in the Reseda section of Los Angeles on the morning of April 10th. Carrillo fled and was caught later that day after abducting a motorist in Kern County with a car chase.
Asked what happened to the children, she told KGET: “I drowned them.”
“I did not want to give up my children to be further abused,” she said.
Police initially said the children were stabbed with a knife, and the Los Angeles County coroner said no drowning was involved.
Carrillo pleaded not guilty Wednesday to the hijacking, attempted car hijacking and taking a vehicle with the owner’s permission, her public defender, Lexi Blythe, said in an email.
Carrillo is being held on $ 2 million bail, along with an additional bail restriction, according to the Kern County Sheriff’s Office.
The Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office did not charge her with the deaths of her children, and a spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for information on Saturday.
Carrillo’s allegation that her children are being abused contradicts their father’s presence is set out in custody records filed by Erik Denton on March 1 in Tulare County.
According to the request for supervision, Carrillo was misleading and he refused to tell him where she kept the children.
Denton tried to intervene in the Department of Children and Family Services in LA County and the LAPD because he believes Carrillo suffers from psychosis and keeps the children away from him somewhere in Los Angeles, reports the Los Angeles Times.
Denton has asked police to take her in for a psychiatric evaluation, the Times reported, and the LAPD has launched an internal investigation into how it handled Denton’s request for help.
Children and family services tried to contact Carrillo, the Times reported, mentioning that a social worker tried to visit her, but no one answered the door.
In the court report, it appears that Denton would visit the children the day after they were found dead.
“I did not want them to be further abused,” Carrillo told KGET.
She said she killed the three “gently”.
“I hugged and kissed them,” she said. “And I kept apologizing. I promised to protect them. ‘
The Associated Press contributed.