FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – A woman who survived a SWAT standoff that resulted in the deaths of three people, including one of her sons, lost custody of the surviving child Friday.
Judge Kenneth Gillespie ruled that Deanna De Jesus will not be allowed any contact with her 7-year-old son.
Gillespie made the decision after De Jesus told him that she knew her husband, William De Jesus, 41, sexually abused her children and that she did not stop it or report it.
Deanna De Jesus and the 7-year-old boy were injured when police said her husband held them hostage in a SWAT standoff Feb. 9.
The Broward Sheriff's Office said William De Jesus, his wife and their two children pulled up in a car to a recreational vehicle and asked to use the phone. RV occupant Ovila Plante, 76, of Quebec, approached William De Jesus, who started yelling. There was a confrontation, and William De Jesus shot Plante in the chest and then in the head, killing him, BSO said.
William De Jesus led his wife and their two children into the RV, where Plante's girlfriend, Pierrette Beauchemin, was still inside, BSO said.
Police arrived, and there was a standoff. Beachemin came out of the RV unharmed. When police finally moved in, they found the De Jesuses' 9-year-old son dead and the 7-year-old son and the mother in critical condition. BSO said William De Jesus had stabbed all three of them and then killed himself.
The next court date over the custody of the 7-year-old boy is set for 1:30 p.m. March 2. At that hearing, Deanna De Jesus's mother, Janet Evans, wants to earn visitation rights and the possibility of her grandson living with her.