The heartbroken sisters of the Connecticut mother killed by Capitol cops after a wild car chase through Washington said Friday she was a troubled soul — not a “terrorist.”
Miriam Carey had her 19-month-old daughter, Erica, in the car when police shot her and “didn’t deserve to die like she did,” Valarie Carey, who lives in Brooklyn, told the Daily News.
PEARL GABEL/NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Miriam Carey’s family, seen here talking to the press, has spoken out amid the reports about her mental health.
“Deadly force was not necessary,” said the grieving sister, a retired NYPD transit police sergeant who lives in Bushwick. “They could have rammed the car or disabled the car.”
“There had to be something else they could have done,” chimed in Amy Carey, a registered nurse who lives in Bedford-Stuyvesant. “She didn’t have to die. To know a child was in the car, too, why did they shoot?”
CNN
Valerie Carey, one of Miriam Carey’s sisters, speaks on Miriam’s death.
Authorities have not said whether they were aware of the child’s presence in her mom’s leased black Infiniti.
Little Erica was not hurt and was placed in protective custody, the family said late Friday.
CNN
Amy Carey speaks with CNN about her sister Miriam Carey’s death.
“We don’t know a lot about our niece,” said Amy Carey. “We’re told she’s safe.”
She added it was unclear who would eventually get custody of the child.
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Miriam Carey reportedly feared President Obama was stalking her, which may have led her to go to Washington, D.C., where she crashed her car into the gate of the White House. She was later shot and killed by police.
“We don’t know if (Erica) is going to be with us or the father. She should be amongst our family. That’s where she should be.”
ANTHONY DELMUNDO/NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Relatives of Miriam Carey leave their home with their attorney in Brooklyn on Friday.
The sisters confirmed that Carey, a 34-year-old dental hygienist, suffered from postpartum depression and psychosis and that she had been prescribed medication for depression.
“But that doesn’t mean she’s crazy or that she deserved to have been killed,” Valarie Carey said.
This photo shows Miriam Carey with her child.
Carey and Erica were supposed to visit them in Brooklyn this weekend, the sisters said. But they could not explain why Carey rammed into a White House checkpoint on Thursday and then led police on a lethal car chase through Washington.
“Only Miriam knows exactly why she was in D.C.,” Valarie Carey said. “Unfortunately, my sister is not here to speak for herself. People are dragging her through the mud.”
BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
The aftermath of the case shows emergency equipment scattered on the ground outside the black Infinity Carey was driving.
Family lawyer Eric Sanders said, “There shouldn’t be a rush to judgment.”
“A mother is dead and whether the police actions were appropriate must still be determined,” he said.
MANDEL NGAN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
Raw video footage of police pointing their guns at the suspect outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington.
The Carey sisters spoke out after they identified their sister’s body at the morgue — and amid reports that the doomed woman believed she was the “Prophet of Stamford” and that President Obama was bugging her Stamford condominium.
Miriam Carey seen during happier times.
Carey was so delusional that her boyfriend, Eric Francis, 54, sicced the cops on her twice in 2012, ABC News reported.
But the sisters said all that was news to them.
Miriam Carey ‘didn’t deserve to die like she did,’ Valerie Carey told the Daily News.
“My sister was a beautiful person,” Valarie Carey said. “She had aspirations to be a dentist. She was a loving mother with a lot to live for. I don’t want my sister demonized.”
Family friend Dennis Jones also questioned whether police used appropriate protocol when they took action that left a child “motherless.”
The sisters of the Connecticut mom killed by Capitol cops after a wild car chase through Washington said Friday she was a troubled soul — not a ‘terrorist.’
“These are supposed to be the best-trained officers in the country,” Jones said Friday night in Brooklyn. “Twice, the vehicle had officers surrounding it. Whether they saw there was a child in the back of the car is what we want to know.”
Brooklyn neighbors said the disturbed mom frequently visited and always wore hospital scrubs, even though she got fired from her job last year.
RICHARD HARBUS/FOR NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Carey’s condo located in Stamford, Connecticut.
They said Carey sometimes came with a mystery man in an expensive Porsche Cayenne SUV who they assumed was Erica’s dad.
“When she talked, she was disconnected,” Jamal Hinez said. “I knew she was a bit off.”
RICHARD HARBUS/FOR NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
After Carey was identified, the FBI and other investigators armed with a search warrant descended on her condo and began hauling off evidence.
Three months ago, Carey had a breakdown while on a visit and had to be sedated, he said.
RICHARD HARBUS/FOR NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
CNN reported that they also took some medication used to treat psychotic illnesses such as schizophrenia and found a letter to Carey’s boyfriend that contained a suspicious white power.
“She was kicking and screaming on the gurney,” Hinez said. “She was saying, ‘The world’s gonna end. We’re all gonna die. It’s gonna happen.’”
Hinez said the mystery man showed up in Bushwick early Friday in his Porsche, but he didn’t get past the door.
ANTHONY DELMUNDO/NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
The sister Valerie and Eric Sanders, the family lawyer of Mariam Carey, 34, the woman who tried to ram her way into the White House, at Mariam’s family’s home in Brooklyn.
“He was standing outside the gate, and (Valarie’s) husband told him, ‘Get the f— out of here; we’ve got enough stuff going on,’” Hinez said. “The guy wasn’t even here five minutes.”
Carey was killed Thursday after plowing her car into at least two police cars before crashing into some barricades, where cops shot her dead. She was apparently unarmed.
SUSAN WALSH/AP
Reports say that Carey believed she was the ‘Prophet of Stamford’ and that President Obama was bugging her Stamford condominium.
The chaos erupted as the Capitol was in the grip of a partial government shutdown — and as the House was in the midst of a heated debate over how to end the impasse.
It sent a fresh shudder through Washington, where two weeks earlier a shotgun-toting Navy contractor went on a deadly rampage through the Navy Yard and killed a dozen people before he was killed.
MANDEL NGAN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
Obama, who was not in town Thursday, sought to reassure people that the city was safe by taking a stroll down Pennsylvania Avenue with Vice President Joe Biden to pick up some take-out sandwiches.
Obama, who was not in town Thursday, sought to reassure people that the city was safe by taking a stroll down Pennsylvania Ave. with Vice President Biden to pick up some takeout sandwiches.
AP
Authorities with guns drawn stand outside the car Carey was driving.
But later, Washington suffered another shock when a man poured gasoline on himself and lit himself on fire on the National Mall.
After Carey was identified, the FBI and other investigators armed with a search warrant descended on her condo and began hauling off evidence.
SHAWN THEW/EPA
Bystanders race for cover after shots were fired outside U.S. Capitol on Thursday.
CNN reported that they also took medication used to treat psychotic illnesses such as schizophrenia and found a letter to Carey’s boyfriend that contained a suspicious white power. The substance was being tested.
Local police chief Jon Fontneau said Stamford cops were called to her apartment in December, although he declined to provide any details other than to say it was not a criminal investigation.
ANTHONY DELMUNDO/NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Mariam Carey’s family has said she suffered from ‘postpartum depression after having the baby.’
“It is a two-bedroom apartment, first-floor level,” he said. “It looked like your basic … apartment. Nothing out of the ordinary. She was nothing out of the ordinary that would call attention to herself.”
Erin Jackson, who lived next-door to Carey for four years, said she seemed “like a good mom” and was often seen in the company of a man she believed to be the father.
“The only time I saw her emote negatively was when her tires were stolen this summer,” Jackson, 31, said. “I was walking out, going to work, and she said, ‘Can you believe what they did? They took my tires.’”
Carey “tended to go against the grain a bit” and lost her job as a dental hygienist, said her former boss, Dr. Brian Evans. He also said she suffered a “pretty significant head injury” as a result of a fall toward the end of the nearly two years she worked for him.
But Evans said she gave no sign that the injury had affected her mind.
A recent court case hinted Carey may have fallen on hard times.
The condo association of the building where she lived, Woodside Green Association, sued her in December for more than $2,000 in unpaid fees. The matter was settled Feb. 1.
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