S&L;’s Silent Alarm Ends Kidnap Ordeal : Crime: Two gunmen hold a Newhall financial official and her husband captive in their Palmdale home for 36 hours before trying to rob her branch office, authorities say.

Two gunmen held the assistant manager of a savings and loan and her husband captive in the couple’s Palmdale home for more than a day, then forced the woman to go to her office in a robbery attempt that was foiled by a silent alarm, authorities said Friday.

Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies, responding to the alarm early Friday at Southern California Savings in Newhall, rescued Denise Adkins, 24.

Brian Keith Simms, 29, of Duarte was arrested after a short chase, authorities said. Another man--identified as Tyrone McCraw, 29, of the Pomona area--escaped by commandeering a car at gunpoint, FBI spokesman Jim Neilson said.

Neilson described McCraw as black, 5 feet, 8 inches tall and about 125 pounds. He was last seen wearing a hooded dark sweater and driving a 1989 Toyota Corolla.

The robbers did not harm Adkins and her husband, Dennis, during the 36-hour ordeal in the house in the 5300 block of East Avenue R-11 in Palmdale, authorities said.

“It was a very traumatic experience, but they were not physically abused,” said Michael Iracondo, Denise Adkins’ father. Iracondo accompanied his daughter to a neighbor’s home to be reunited with her husband Friday morning.

Neighbors said they were terrified to learn that the couple had been held captive without anyone’s knowledge in the house on the quiet cul-de-sac in a new subdivision.

“Little did we know what was going on next door,” said Rachel Taylor, a neighbor who was awakened by a distraught Dennis Adkins pounding on her door. Adkins, bound for most of his captivity, managed to untie himself after the kidnapers left for the savings and loan office with his wife early Friday.

Taylor and Dennis Adkins called sheriff’s deputies. But by the time their report was received, other deputies were already responding to the alarm at the savings and loan.

The couple’s ordeal began Wednesday evening when Denise Adkins returned home from work and was confronted by two men, one armed with a pistol, who had broken into the house, authorities said. The men had also armed themselves with a shotgun they found in the residence.

Adkins’ husband, a Los Angeles city firefighter, was working an overnight shift.

Early Thursday morning, the gunmen forced Denise Adkins to call her husband and ask him to come home on the pretext that she was suffering severe back pains, according to authorities and neighbors. The robbers, who wore masks, bound Dennis Adkins when he arrived, then held the couple captive in the house for the next 24 hours.

“He said they treated them fairly decently,” said Billy Pricer, a Sheriff’s Department chaplain who comforted Dennis Adkins. “They gave him water and food, they let him smoke a cigarette and go to the bathroom.”

The robbers left Dennis Adkins bound in a bathroom early Friday morning and took his wife to the Southern California Savings branch office in the 26400 block of Sierra Highway in Newhall, authorities said.

Adkins was warned that his wife would be harmed if he attempted to free himself, Pricer said.

About 5:30 a.m., the robbers forced Denise Adkins to open the savings office and told her to remove money from the vault. But she was unable to open it because a time lock was set to remain on until shortly before the office opens at 9 a.m., said John Doyle, a spokesman for Southern California Savings.

Doyle said the robbers forced Adkins to turn off one alarm, but she triggered a second alarm when she complied with their instructions to try to open the vault.

The alarm sounded at the Santa Clarita sheriff’s station about 5:45 a.m., deputies said.

Neither Neilson nor Doyle would say whether Adkins triggered the silent alarm intentionally or it went off automatically, citing security considerations.

Deputies arrived at the savings and loan shortly afterward to rescue Denise Adkins and arrest Simms.

McCraw fled on foot, then stole a car from an unidentified driver at gunpoint near the savings branch and escaped, Neilson said.

Sheriff’s Sgt. Gunars Heine said detectives are trying to determine whether the suspects had watched the couple in the days before the kidnaping and why they singled out Adkins for the robbery attempt.

Neighbors said they did not notice any suspicious activity, although Taylor said she had thought it strange that the couple’s trash cans remained outside on Thursday and that the husband’s car was in the driveway during a time when he normally was at work.

Iracondo said his daughter and son-in-law bought their house in Palmdale two years ago partly because they believed the area was more tranquil and had less crime than the San Fernando Valley, where they had previously lived.

“They felt a lot safer out here,” he said.