TRENTON - The standoff between an armed man barricaded in his South Ward home with children as hostages stretched into a second day as negotiators continue to coax him from the house where law enforcement sources say he killed his girlfriend and her child.

Trenton police said there were no updates on the standoff which now stands at 17 hours. Officers doing a wellness check found the decomposing body of a woman and were forced to withdraw by the armed man, law enforcement sources told The Times.

Negotiators from the New Jersey State Police, FBI, and city police have been trying to talk the unidentified man out of the home since the crisis began Friday afternoon.

Mercer County Prosecutor Joseph Bocchini said last night that there were children inside with the barricaded suspect, and negotiators were urging the man to release them.

Law enforcement sources told The Times yesterday the suspect, who is not the father of the children, killed their mother and her fourth child prior to police arrival. A family member identified the woman as Carmen Kelly, 42, a mother of five.

Her cousin, Ray Kelly, said she had been living at the house on the 200 block of Grand Street with the man for about two months with her children.

Carmen Kelly's oldest child, a 19-year-old autistic son, is safe with relatives, Ray Kelly said. Carmen Kelly also has two daughters, ages 17 and 14, along with a son in his early teens and a 4-year-old boy. Ray Kelly had not been told which of the children had been killed.

The suspect's identity has not been released.

A heavy rain descending around 11 p.m. last night and continuing into the early morning put a damper on the standoff. Officers and equipment transitioned through the established crime scene with shift changes, bringing manpower to a low ebb around 3 a.m.

The front of the home on the 200 block of Grand Street was lit with a searchlight. Lights were on inside on the second floor, but no noise could be heard from outside the crime scene a block away.

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