Mom Arrested In Kids' Bay Deaths

(CBS/AP)  A woman who tossed her three young children off a pier into San Francisco Bay near Fishermen's Wharf has been arrested, authorities said Thursday, and the Coast Guard searched for the bodies of two of the children.

The body of a third child was recovered Wednesday more than three miles from the pier near a yacht club not far from the Golden Gate Bridge, reports CBS News correspondent John Blackstone.

Lashaun Harris, 23, of Oakland, was booked on three counts of murder and three counts of assault on a child with great bodily injury, according to Susan Fahey, spokeswoman for the San Francisco Sheriff's Department. Harris remained in custody early Thursday with no court date set, she said. Harris' children were identified as Trayshaun Harris, 6, Travante Greely, 2, and Joshua Harris, 1.

Witnesses on the pedestrian pier had reported seeing a woman strip three young children naked then throw them into the Bay.

While rescuers searched for the children Wednesday night, an empty stroller was visible on the pier. A small inflatable Coast Guard boat hugged the water front as rescuers used hand-held flashlights to search under the pier. Larger Coast Guard and San Francisco police boats searched the water with high-powered flashlights.

Mayor Gavin Newsom came to the scene to get briefed by authorities, telling reporters, "I'm sick to my stomach," before leaving.

Lashaun Harris told authorities that voices had told her to throw her children into the water, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. It was not immediately known whether she had an attorney.

Asia Powell, who identified herself as Harris' cousin, said Harris was taking medication for a mental illness.

"When the doctors seen her she would straighten up you know. And then when she wasn't around the doctors, she would be on a whole different level, off her medication," Powell told CBS station KPIX-TV. "I know that she would never hurt her kids."

Harris had been staying with her children at a Salvation Army shelter in Oakland, the Chronicle reported.

"I just talked to her yesterday," Mary Ann Ramirez, the shelter's social services manager, told the newspaper Wednesday. "We had our usual, 'How are you doing, how's the kids.' I would never have guessed in a million years that today she would do that."

The pier is in the Embarcadero area, which draws tourists to the historic Ferry Building within view of Coit Tower and the landmark Transamerica pyramid. It's about a mile from Fishermen's Wharf.