A man and woman are in custody for allegedly beating a 59-year female crossing guard and stealing her stop sign and whistle in front of nearly two dozen school children and adults Monday afternoon in the Florence-Firestone area.

Sheriff's investigators said the two suspects drove up to the intersection in a black Ford Expedition at about 2 p.m. and began to turn east on Firestone Boulevard from northbound Hooper Avenue. The crossing guard raised her stop sign higher in the air and told the suspects, "You have to stop, the children come first."

Witnesses told detectives Jose Hernandez, 27, yelled at the crossing guard that he was not stopping. As he continued to yell at the crossing guard, Vanessa Del Pilar Martinez, 20, got out of the passenger side of the car and approached the crossing guard, investigators said. As the crossing guard tried to walk away, Martinez began hitting the crossing guard with her fists, knocking her to the ground, according to investigators.

Hernandez then got out of his car, approached the victim, and forcibly took her stop sign while his female cohort forcibly removed a lanyard holding the victim’s whistle and work identification from around her neck, authorities said. "This is very surprising," said Lt. Mike Thatcher of the Sheriff's Department's Century Station.

"We have never seen anything like this before and hope we never do again." The pair got back into their car and drove east on Firestone Boulevard and out of view.

The robbery occurred in the presence of about 20 elementary school children and adults. Several adults provided information to deputies at the scene, including the license plate number of the suspects' car. Deputies from Century Station traced the car to a home in the Florence-Firestone area and were able to locate the two suspects and arrest them, according to Thatcher.

The victim’s stop sign was found in the suspects' residence.

[Update 8:25 a.m.: Florence-Firestone, an unincorporated area of South Los Angeles with more than 60,000 residents, ranks among the most violent communities in the county, according to crime reports collected in The Times' interactive crime mapping database Crime L.A.

In the six months ending Oct. 24, the most recent for which complete data are available, 446 serious violent crimes were reported in Florence-Firestone, including seven homicides, six rapes, 223 aggravated assaults and 210 robberies.]

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