Abuse Investigation Leads to 2 Dead Children in Storage Unit

The case of two missing children, 3 year-old Delylah Tara and 6 year-old Shaun Tara, in Monterey County led investigators to Plumas County. "This is child abuse, the likes of which we haven't experienced here (in Plumas County)".

The two were being held on suspicion of felony child abuse, torture and mayhem. The station, citing police sources, said the children who were found dead were siblings ages 5 and 3.

Attorneys Douglas Prouty, who represents the 39-year-old, and Robert Zernich, who represents the teen, both declined to comment. An autopsy is pending and their deaths are being investigated as a homicide, according to a police press release.

Crime scene investigators shoot photographs of items removed from an apartment in Salinas on Tuesday that is connected to two dead children found in a Redding storage unit.

The girl was taken into protective custody and is receiving medical care in Sacramento hospital, the Redding police said.

Huntsman has previously been charged with felony burglary, grant theft, possession of a controlled substance as well as child abuse and child endangerment.

Huntsman is the 9-year-old girl's aunt and had custody of the girl; Huntsman is the biological mother of the 12-year-old twins, the Plumas News said.

It began with a call about a possible child abuse case in the small town of Quincy, about 350km northeast of San Francisco. The little girl was in such bad shape that Sheriff Greg Hagwood says the office is expected to grant leave to several persons who were so shaken by the sight of what the abused child had been forced to endure. Detectives asked the suspects about that information and learned about the storage locker in Redding, about 140 miles away, the sheriff told the Bee. "Anyone not affected needs to get some help".

Redding police said that further investigation following the arrest of the pair led to the discovery of the children inside the storage shed. The Associated Press typically does not identify abuse victims; it is not naming the teen or the woman because their relationship to the children is unclear.

Meanwhile, south of San Francisco, authorities searched a home in Salinas, where Huntsman and Curiel recently lived.

When they arrived, they found the girl in a vehicle - almost frozen to death and with multiple injuries, including bones that had been broken for quite some time. Their names haven't been released, and no charges have been filed in their deaths. Lawyers for Huntsman and Curiel declined to comment Tuesday.

The Monterey County Department of Social Services had investigated Huntsman and her family within the past year for general neglect, said Elliott Robinson, director of social services.