Local News in Brief : Girl Plays Dead to Survive
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The teen-age girl who survived a triple slaying in Long Beach Monday feigned death, then befriended her would-be killer during a night spent in a home with the bodies of her boyfriend and two others, police said.
The 17-year-old, who was not identified, left the residence with her 2-year-old daughter Monday morning after telling her attacker she was going to work, Long Beach homicide Detective William Collette said. She summoned police, who surrounded the house and arrested a man after three more shots were fired and the gas was turned on in the residence.
Gerrard J. Oliver, 54, was booked for investigation of murder and assault with a deadly weapon and held without bail. Paramedics who rushed inside the home discovered the bodies of Oliver’s common-law wife, Bernice Simmons, 53; her son Michael Lee Simmons, 21, and Jesse Rattler Jr., 24, a border at the home.
The young mother suffered gunshot wounds in her left arm and back and underwent surgery at Memorial Medical Center.
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