Police Storm House, Seize Woman, 65

After a three-day standoff, a police special weapons team stormed a South Los Angeles home early Thursday and used stun guns to capture a 65-year-old woman whose random gunfire had kept officers at bay.

Some 12 hours before Barbara Maxson was taken into custody, Capt. Stephen Gates, 51, brother of Police Chief Daryl F. Gates, was grazed in the head by a bullet as he approached the house in the 800 block of West 132nd Street to try to persuade her to give up.

“It was a near-tragedy,” police spokesman Cmdr. William Booth said.

What puzzled the woman’s neighbors was the length of the standoff.

“I figured they’d go right in on Monday when it started,” said one neighbor, who asked that his name not be published. “When they didn’t, I couldn’t figure out what was happening.”

The police had decided to wait.

“We have to react to tactical situations,” said Lt. Fred Nixon, another Police Department spokesman. “Did we wait because she was 65 years old? No. However, it was one of several considerations. We also had information that she had a history of mental illness.

“We had hoped that she’d walk out and give up. But she didn’t.

Officers were called Monday afternoon after the woman’s daughter, Joan Lucas, 44, reported that Maxson had threatened her with a handgun. The woman had barricaded herself inside the window-barred home and LAPD’s special weapons and tactics team was called in.

But after arriving, the SWAT team decided not to force its way inside, Nixon said. Officers continued to talk to Maxson, but she still refused to surrender.

The SWAT team then left the scene Monday evening and several uniformed officers stayed behind, Nixon said.

It remained that way until Wednesday afternoon when Maxson, who had refused to talk to officers earlier in the day and on Tuesday, re-established contact. Believing there was no danger, Capt. Gates, commander of LAPD’s Southeast Division, then approached the house to talk to the woman.

As he neared the front of the house, one shot was fired through a sliding-glass window, grazing Gates in the head. He also was cut on the face by flying glass.

The SWAT team was called back. The police battering ram also was sent to the house.

The vehicle punched a hole in the house, prompting more gunfire from inside. But police did not return fire, Nixon said.

Shortly before 4 a.m. Thursday, SWAT members entered the house and cornered the woman in a bathroom. Several tear gas canisters were thrown into the bathroom, but the woman apparently covered herself with a blanket in the bathtub to avoid the gas.

When the officers came in, Maxson fired a wild shot, Nixon said. But none of the SWAT team members was hit.

The officers then fired electrically charged darts from a Taser gun that temporarily immobilized Maxson.

Nixon said another handgun and an M-1 carbine were found in the home, which had furniture stacked up against the doors.

Maxson was undergoing psychiatric evaluation late Thursday at a Torrance hospital, authorities said.