Colusa police: Woman held captive for 10 days

A 33-year-old Yuba City woman grabbed her 3-year-old son and fled a home where Colusa police said they had been held captive since New Year's Eve.

The woman, whose identity has been withheld, escaped sometime before 5 p.m. Thursday from the East Oak Street home where she had been kept, Colusa police reported.

A passing motorist saw the woman and took her and her son to the Colusa County Sheriff's Department. The Colusa police were notified then.

The woman was treated at Colusa Regional Medical Center for injuries consistent with her story that when she had tried to leave the home before, her captor had beaten her severely.

The boy was not injured, police said. Police arrested Jermaine Lonell Roberts, 35, of Colusa, at 6:39 p.m. Thursday in connection with the kidnapping.

Roberts and the woman had apparently been involved in a relationship, but that it had been over for several months, police said.

The woman, who was not listed as missing, reported that she was apprehended about 11 p.m. on Dec. 31 while she was sitting in her car on the 500 block of Clay Street, police said.

The boy was asleep in the back seat.

"The suspect, Jermaine Lonell Roberts, forced the victim to drive to his home on Oak Street, just outside the city limits, where she held her and her son there for several days," the police said in a statement. "When the victim tried to flee the house, Roberts caught her and severely beat the victim, inflicting significant injuries."

The woman escaped when Roberts was sleeping, police said.

Roberts had fled his home and was found in a neighbor's residence, where he was arrested, police said.

He was booked into the Colusa County Jail on suspicion of kidnapping, false imprisonment, oral copulation by force, and assault with a deadly weapon not a firearm, with the likelihood of great bodily injury.

He also was booked on two counts of threatening to commit a crime with the intent to terrorize, robbery burglary, the sale of an access card with the intent to commit fraud, inflicting corporal injury upon a spouse or cohabitant, and battery causing serious bodily injury.

Bail was set at $315,000.