Children Rescued From Harbor, Mother Arrested

A Port Hueneme woman with a history of marital problems tried to drown herself and her two children by holding them underwater early Wednesday morning in Channel Islands Harbor, authorities said.

Forty-year-old Brian Wiggins, whom officials are calling a hero, rescued the family from a channel near his residence after he heard the woman’s 9-year-old son meekly yelling for help.

Oxnard police are not speculating on alleged motives of the woman, a native of India who speaks little English, but Sgt. Lee Wilcox ruled out the possibility that it was an accident.

“I don’t know of any logical reason why they would be swimming in freezing cold water in January fully clothed,” he said.

Narinder Virk, 39, was arrested about noon on suspicion of attempted murder of her 6-year-old daughter Harpreet and 9-year-old son, whose friends call him Sonny.

Wilcox said the woman refused to speak when taken into custody, but that the children said things that led to their mother’s arrest.

“Children of that age don’t make things up that are that traumatic in nature,” Wilcox said.

Virk lived with her husband, Santokh, and children in a condominium complex on Anchor Avenue in Port Hueneme. But officials said the husband had flown to India on Tuesday evening and had not been notified of the incident.

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The couple have lived in the United States for about eight years and in Port Hueneme for about two years, Wilcox said.

Authorities said Narinder Virk allegedly woke her children shortly before 2 a.m. Wednesday and walked with them for two blocks to reach the channel. From the family’s condominium, the trio had to cross Victoria Avenue, a main thoroughfare.

They reached the channel through an open lot one house away from where Wiggins, an ex-lifeguard, lives.

Wiggins said he and his wife, Angie, were sleeping near an open window when he heard a plaintive cry for help.

“I didn’t know what it was or where it was coming from and at first I thought maybe some kids were taking a kayak for a joy ride or something,” he said.

The couple ran onto their second-floor balcony and called out in an attempt to locate the person in the darkness. “I heard something down there in the water, so I ran downstairs and didn’t even think, you just go,” Brian Wiggins said.

Wiggins, who played water polo in high school and served as a lifeguard for three years, said he ran downstairs, leaped across two concrete docks and dove into the 57-degree water. He said instinct and adrenaline drove him.

“I grabbed the woman first, because she was the only one I saw.” He said he struggled to get her and her heavy waterlogged clothes onto the deck. “Then my heart just dropped, because I looked back and saw the other two and, you know, I have kids the same age.”

Wiggins, a salesman, dove back into the water and grabbed Harpreet who was floating face down. When he got her onto the dock, he checked for a pulse, which was weak, and performed mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Then he went back in the water and hauled out her older brother.

“I’m really not the hero here,” the father of three said during an interview at his house Wednesday afternoon. “It was the boy who yelled out and saved his sister, mom and himself. He’s the one who saved them, not me.”

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Virk’s 6-year-old daughter was in stable condition and under observation Wednesday night at Northridge Hospital Medical Center, Wilcox said. The girl’s 9-year-old brother was treated at Ventura County Medical Center in Ventura and released to county Social Service workers, who retrieved clothes for the boy from the family’s condo and were attempting to contact relatives in Northridge.

Their mother, who was examined at the county hospital and released, remained jailed Wednesday night on suspicion of attempted murder in lieu of $500,000 bail.

According to police records, the Virks have a history of domestic disturbances, including threats of violence, choking and abandonment.

And neighbors said Wednesday that they had heard several verbal disputes from the Virk home in the past.

“I heard them yelling at each other a few times,” said neighbor Tara Butler, who has lived across a narrow walkway from the couple since 1998.

Elisa Quezada, who describes herself as Virk’s close friend, said she shared a cup of tea Tuesday afternoon with Virk, who was sick with the flu.

“She told me that they fight a lot, sometimes because he wanted to send her to India and she didn’t want to be in India,” said Quezada, who lives in the same condominium complex.

“When I went to give her tea at 2:30, she didn’t know the husband was going to India. But one time, he went to India for six months and she was always sick and sad about him going and leaving her here,” she said.

Port Hueneme detectives said Narinder Virk had called several times to report domestic disturbances.

Last Feb. 16, Narinder Virk called police to say her husband had abandoned the family five months earlier and left them without food or money.

She also said that before her husband left the United States for India in November 1998 he grabbed her by the throat and tried to strangle her.

Virk said that the incident occurred the day before he left and that she called 911 for an ambulance and was taken to St. John’s Regional Medical Center in Oxnard. But when she arrived, she lied about the cause of her injuries, saying one of her children had accidentally injured her.

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No official police report was filed in the alleged choking.

Santokh Virk apparently returned early last March and his wife told police she would not cooperate in any further investigation of her husband.

But on April 30, Port Hueneme police officers again responded to the condo--this time to handle an argument between the couple. Port Hueneme Sgt. Ken Dobbe said that during that incident the husband called his wife a liar and had packed his car and was planning to leave. Santokh Virk told officers he would provide for his family and then left.

Dobbe said Wednesday that Narinder Virk was despondent and desperate in her marriage. He said she reported last spring she had been promised an allowance from her husband that never materialized and that she had to depend on friends and neighbors to feed her children.

“She said her husband was pressuring her to bring the children back to India and that she was afraid,” Dobbe said. “She told the officer her husband’s family were all high-profile police officials . . . and that if she returned she would be killed or imprisoned.”

Times Community News reporter Katie Cooper contributed to this story.