For weeks she had complained to her family about strange noises she heard coming from underneath the house. At night, the old woman often heard mysterious knocks. A few days ago, the police made a disturbing discovery: the cause was not a possum or a raccoon, but a naked man who, according to the authorities, lived in a narrow space under the woman’s homea 93-year-old from the El Sereno neighborhood of Los Angeles.
“We usually heard the noises late at night, so we thought they were animals,” he said the woman’s son-in-law, Ricardo Silvaat NBC News. But last Thursday, November 7, the noises became so intense that the family decided to call the police.
“The Los Angeles Police Department responded to a call in the 3600 block of Locke Avenue around 10:30 pm and found a man hiding under the house,” an LAPD spokesperson confirmed. The intruder did not want to leave what he considered his underground ‘home’, so “officers contacted the SWAT team for assistance in the arrest,” the spokesperson added.
A lengthy standoff ensued before the man was taken into custody. He is now suspected of trespassing on private property. “He refused to leave,” Silva told NBC News. “He was not afraid of the police dogs and the first two attempts with tear gas were ineffective,” he added.
Police identified the suspect as Isaac Betancourt, 27 years old, found without clothes at the time of arrest. He was released on Saturday afternoon and is due to appear in court on December 6. The suspect had already been arrested several times between July 2022 and August of this year, according to the LASD Inmate Information Center.