Suspect's mother: 'They took a lot of stuff'

Suspect Alejandro Avila's mother, Adelina, speaks with reporters Thursday.

(CNN) -- The Orange County Sheriff's Department announced Friday it has arrested Alejandro Avila in connection with the kidnapping and killing of 5-year-old Samantha Runnion.

Investigators reportedly had taken the 27-year-old man to a hotel Thursday night while they were questioning him and serving warrants on his mother's and sister's apartments.

A freelance photographer tracked down the suspect's mother at her home.

CNN Anchor Kyra Phillips talked with John Casper about the Thursday interview with Adelina Avila in the doorway at her Lake Elsinore apartment in southern California.

PHILLIPS: OK, I understand we have John Casper on the phone with us now. He's the freelance photographer who shot that interview with Alejandro Avila's mother.

Before we talk, maybe we can show a clip of that interview. All right, let's take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ADELINA AVILA: He is not being charged. They are just investigating. He has a green car. But his car is a Thunderbird.

CASPER: What were they looking for here?

AVILA: I don't know. Some type of evidence. They took a lot of stuff, I don't know. We don't know.

CASPER: What kind of stuff?

AVILA: Like, I had a serape on a rocking chair. They took that, because it has a lot of hairs, and I told them it is the cat's hair. So they took it.

CASPER: Did they mention this little girl who was killed in the investigation?

AVILA: They gave me the search warrant, and it mentioned the little girl, yes. And I said, well, I don't think my son did it. But I was -- as long as he's cooperating. I don't have anything against that.

CASPER: You don't think your son would do something like that.

AVILA: No, no.

CASPER: Is that your son you are talking to now on the phone?

AVILA: Yes. Since he was detained -- he is detained for investigation, but he is not arrested. This is the first time I have talked to him.

CASPER: Where was he last Monday and Tuesday?

AVILA: Monday he was at the mall in Ontario. And Tuesday, he was -- I don't know, here with us. And then, he comes and goes. I just told him what I know.

QUESTION: What I don't understand is, why, ask him if I may, why did they put him in a hotel in Orange County?

AVILA: They want to know why they put you in a hotel. (She asked her son)

Because he is not arrested.

CASPER: That is where he is staying?

AVILA: Because he is going to be there over the weekend. That's what they told me when they took the stuff.

CASPER: Where are they keeping him?

AVILA: In Orange County, in some kind of a hotel.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PHILLIPS: Adelina Avila is the mother of 27-year-old Alejandro Avila. This is the man who has been arrested in connection to the kidnap, (killing) and rape of 5-year-old Samantha Runnion, a story that has pretty much shocked the nation, as we have been telling you about it for the past few days.

John Casper is freelance photographer that shot that interview. He is on the phone with us now.

John, kind of take us back. When did you decide to head over there? How did you know head over there? Kind of take us step by step.

CASPER: Well, Kyra, we of course tried to stay on top of this story, knowing that part of it is in Orange County, and part of it literally in our own back yard. And we got word that one of the local stations was out in the area, that something was about to break. So we headed down to the Lake Elsinore area, began looking for signs. It was a big area to look for. But we began looking for police helicopters, things like that. Eventually found something that pointed to the direction.

PHILLIPS: So you didn't know exactly where to go?

CASPER: No, we didn't. When things like this happen, word travels pretty quickly. You know, it is always ask people in the area. They know what's going on, and they always point the way for you.

PHILLIPS: So you knocked on the door, how did you finally come to the home of the Avilas?

CASPER: We followed a police helicopter that was over the area, and got there actually just in time as they were towing the car away. The car they towed away was not the much talked about green car; this was the white car, that had evidence stickers on the side, and they towed it on a flatbed trailer and towed it past us to take as evidence.

PHILLIPS: When you interviewed the mother, I heard you ask if she was on the phone with Alejandro. Was she on the phone that moment with her son?

CASPER: Yes, she was, as a matter of fact. She had been talking to us through the door, and didn't want to go on camera. And while she was talking to us, the phone rang, and she indicated that it was her son. I thought it was a bit unusual her son would be calling her from jail, because that's where we all assumed he would be. While this was taking place, another reporter inadvertently leaned on the door bell, and when that happened, she opened the door to talk to us with phone in hand.

PHILLIPS: That's so bizarre. What did you think about what she said today? Did she seem calm, nervous, confident that her son is innocent?

CASPER: As a matter of fact, she did not seem very worried to me at all. A mother whose son was, you know, whose son will be going through something this traumatic, she didn't seem all that concerned. I didn't see any sign of tears. She didn't seem overly upset. And continued in a pretty conversational manner.

PHILLIPS: So she didn't let you in, and you didn't see inside the apartment and how this family lived.

CASPER: No. Later we did step in the front door where she showed us a photo of her son, which I thought, you know, for a mother who's trying to protect her son, I don't know why she would want to put his photo out there, but that was her choice, and she seemed fairly confident that he didn't have anything do with this. She would relay questions to him on the phone that she had in her hand.

PHILLIPS: Was she asking him on the phone?

CASPER: Mostly like where are you held, why do they have you there? Those are the questions we were asking that she was relaying to him. Much of the conversation she had with him was in Spanish and we couldn't keep up with that. So we began relaying the questions, and that's when we found out that he was not in jail, that he, in fact, was in a hotel. And we asked which hotel, and he asked somebody with him, "what hotel am I in?" Then the response came back, "I can't tell you which hotel I'm in, I'm with some deputies here. I'm not free to leave, but I'm not under arrest."

PHILLIPS: Did you ask her about if he had a criminal past, ever committed a crime before, had been arrested, put in jail?

CASPER: At some point she did volunteer information that he had never -- something along the lines that he had never been to jail before, or never done anything wrong before. That's the information she volunteered at the time. That, of course, is probably going to be a subject of much scrutiny.

PHILLIPS: I'm sorry. I missed the last part of what you just said. I apologize.

CASPER: That of course will be a subject of something that will be quite closely looked at, is did he have anything prior?

PHILLIPS: Were there any brothers or sisters living at home? Was it just mom and Alejandro?

CASPER: Well, in the same apartment complex, his sister lives directly across from his mother, and we observed them taking a lot of evidence out of the sister's apartment. We don't know -- we didn't see what was taken out of his mother's apartment, although she did indicate there was a serape and possibly some shoes that were taken out.

PHILLIPS: All right, John Casper, good job, I got to tell you.