The heartbroken sisters of the Connecticut mother killed by Capitol cops after a wild car chase through Washington said Friday she was a troubled soul — not a “terrorist.” 
 
 Miriam Carey had her 19-month-old daughter, Erica, in the car when police shot her and “didn’t deserve to die like she did,” Valarie Carey, who lives in Brooklyn, told the Daily News. 
 
 “Deadly force was not necessary,” said the grieving sister, a retired NYPD transit police sergeant who lives in Bushwick. “They could have rammed the car or disabled the car.” 
 
 Miriam Carey's family, seen here talking to the press, has spoken out amid the reports about her mental health. (Pearl Gabel/New York Daily News) 
 
 “There had to be something else they could have done,” chimed in Amy Carey, a registered nurse who lives in Bedford-Stuyvesant. “She didn’t have to die. To know a child was in the car, too, why did they shoot?” 
 
 Authorities have not said whether they were aware of the child’s presence in her mom’s leased black Infiniti. 
 
 Valerie Carey, one of Miriam Carey's sisters, speaks on Miriam's death. (CNN) 
 
 Little Erica was not hurt and was placed in protective custody, the family said late Friday. 
 
 “We don’t know a lot about our niece,” said Amy Carey. “We’re told she’s safe.” 
 
 Amy Carey speaks with CNN about her sister Miriam Carey's death. (CNN) 
 
 She added it was unclear who would eventually get custody of the child. 
 
 “We don’t know if (Erica) is going to be with us or the father. She should be amongst our family. That’s where she should be.” 
 
 Miriam Carey reportedly feared President Obama was stalking her, which may have led her to go to Washington, D.C., where she crashed her car into the gate of the White House. She was later shot and killed by police. (Facebook) 
 
 The sisters confirmed that Carey, a 34-year-old dental hygienist, suffered from postpartum depression and psychosis and that she had been prescribed medication for depression. 
 
 “But that doesn’t mean she’s crazy or that she deserved to have been killed,” Valarie Carey said. 
 
 Relatives of Miriam Carey leave their home with their attorney in Brooklyn on Friday. (Anthony DelMundo/New York Daily News) 
 
 Carey and Erica were supposed to visit them in Brooklyn this weekend, the sisters said. But they could not explain why Carey rammed into a White House checkpoint on Thursday and then led police on a lethal car chase through Washington. 
 
 “Only Miriam knows exactly why she was in D.C.,” Valarie Carey said. “Unfortunately, my sister is not here to speak for herself. People are dragging her through the mud.” 
 
 This photo shows Miriam Carey with her child. 
 
 Family lawyer Eric Sanders said, “There shouldn’t be a rush to judgment.” 
 
 “A mother is dead and whether the police actions were appropriate must still be determined,” he said. 
 
 The aftermath of the case shows emergency equipment scattered on the ground outside the black Infinity Carey was driving. (BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/Getty Images) 
 
 The Carey sisters spoke out after they identified their sister’s body at the morgue — and amid reports that the doomed woman believed she was the “Prophet of Stamford” and that President Obama was bugging her Stamford condominium. 
 
 Carey was so delusional that her boyfriend, Eric Francis, 54, sicced the cops on her twice in 2012, ABC News reported. 
 
 Raw video footage of police pointing their guns at the suspect outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington. (MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images) 
 
 But the sisters said all that was news to them. 
 
 “My sister was a beautiful person,” Valarie Carey said. “She had aspirations to be a dentist. She was a loving mother with a lot to live for. I don’t want my sister demonized.” 
 
 Miriam Carey seen during happier times. 
 
 Family friend Dennis Jones also questioned whether police used appropriate protocol when they took action that left a child “motherless.” 
 
 “These are supposed to be the best-trained officers in the country,” Jones said Friday night in Brooklyn. “Twice, the vehicle had officers surrounding it. Whether they saw there was a child in the back of the car is what we want to know.” 
 
 Miriam Carey 'didn’t deserve to die like she did,' Valerie Carey told the Daily News. 
 
 Brooklyn neighbors said the disturbed mom frequently visited and always wore hospital scrubs, even though she got fired from her job last year. 
 
 They said Carey sometimes came with a mystery man in an expensive Porsche Cayenne SUV who they assumed was Erica’s dad. 
 
 The sisters of the Connecticut mom killed by Capitol cops after a wild car chase through Washington said Friday she was a troubled soul — not a 'terrorist.' 
 
 “When she talked, she was disconnected,” Jamal Hinez said. “I knew she was a bit off.” 
 
 Three months ago, Carey had a breakdown while on a visit and had to be sedated, he said. 
 
 Carey's condo located in Stamford, Connecticut. (Richard Harbus/for New York Daily News) 
 
 “She was kicking and screaming on the gurney,” Hinez said. “She was saying, ‘The world’s gonna end. We’re all gonna die. It’s gonna happen.’” 
 
 Hinez said the mystery man showed up in Bushwick early Friday in his Porsche, but he didn’t get past the door. 
 
 After Carey was identified, the FBI and other investigators armed with a search warrant descended on her condo and began hauling off evidence. (Richard Harbus/for New York Daily News) 
 
 “He was standing outside the gate, and (Valarie’s) husband told him, ‘Get the f--- out of here; we’ve got enough stuff going on,'” Hinez said. “The guy wasn’t even here five minutes.” 
 
 Carey was killed Thursday after plowing her car into at least two police cars before crashing into some barricades, where cops shot her dead. She was apparently unarmed. 
 
 CNN reported that they also took some medication used to treat psychotic illnesses such as schizophrenia and found a letter to Carey’s boyfriend that contained a suspicious white power. (Richard Harbus/for New York Daily News) 
 
 The chaos erupted as the Capitol was in the grip of a partial government shutdown — and as the House was in the midst of a heated debate over how to end the impasse. 
 
 It sent a fresh shudder through Washington, where two weeks earlier a shotgun-toting Navy contractor went on a deadly rampage through the Navy Yard and killed a dozen people before he was killed. 
 
 The sister Valerie and Eric Sanders, the family lawyer of Mariam Carey, 34, the woman who tried to ram her way into the White House, at Mariam's family's home in Brooklyn. (Anthony DelMundo/New York Daily News) 
 
 Obama, who was not in town Thursday, sought to reassure people that the city was safe by taking a stroll down Pennsylvania Ave. with Vice President Biden to pick up some takeout sandwiches. 
 
 But later, Washington suffered another shock when a man poured gasoline on himself and lit himself on fire on the National Mall. 
 
 Reports say that Carey believed she was the 'Prophet of Stamford' and that President Obama was bugging her Stamford condominium. (Susan Walsh/AP) 
 
 After Carey was identified, the FBI and other investigators armed with a search warrant descended on her condo and began hauling off evidence. 
 
 CNN reported that they also took medication used to treat psychotic illnesses such as schizophrenia and found a letter to Carey’s boyfriend that contained a suspicious white power. The substance was being tested. 
 
 Obama, who was not in town Thursday, sought to reassure people that the city was safe by taking a stroll down Pennsylvania Avenue with Vice President Joe Biden to pick up some take-out sandwiches. (MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images) 
 
 Local police chief Jon Fontneau said Stamford cops were called to her apartment in December, although he declined to provide any details other than to say it was not a criminal investigation. 
 
 “It is a two-bedroom apartment, first-floor level,” he said. “It looked like your basic ... apartment. Nothing out of the ordinary. She was nothing out of the ordinary that would call attention to herself.” 
 
 Authorities with guns drawn stand outside the car Carey was driving. (ap) 
 
 Erin Jackson, who lived next-door to Carey for four years, said she seemed “like a good mom” and was often seen in the company of a man she believed to be the father. 
 
 “The only time I saw her emote negatively was when her tires were stolen this summer,” Jackson, 31, said. “I was walking out, going to work, and she said, ‘Can you believe what they did? They took my tires.’” 
 
 Bystanders race for cover after shots were fired outside U.S. Capitol on Thursday. (SHAWN THEW/EPA) 
 
 Carey “tended to go against the grain a bit” and lost her job as a dental hygienist, said her former boss, Dr. Brian Evans. He also said she suffered a “pretty significant head injury” as a result of a fall toward the end of the nearly two years she worked for him. 
 
 But Evans said she gave no sign that the injury had affected her mind. 
 
 Mariam Carey’s family has said she suffered from ‘postpartum depression after having the baby.’ (Anthony DelMundo/New York Daily News) 
 
 A recent court case hinted Carey may have fallen on hard times. 
 
 The condo association of the building where she lived, Woodside Green Association, sued her in December for more than $2,000 in unpaid fees. The matter was settled Feb. 1. 
 
 With Kerry Burke, Stephen Rex Brown, Joey Scarborough, Thomas Tracy and Corinne Lestch 
 
 csiemaszko@nydailynews.com 
 
 Sign up for BREAKING NEWS Emails privacy policy Thanks for subscribing! ||||| Diagnosed with depression and psychosis, Miriam Carey had recently stopped taking her medications, according to investigators. They say travel records show she drove directly from Connecticut to Washington, D.C., on Thursday, when the chaos began. NBC's Pete Williams 
 
 The woman who led authorities on a chase from the White House to the Capitol before she was killed by police may have thought that President Barack Obama was stalking her, law enforcement sources told NBC News. 
 
 The sources said that the woman, Miriam Carey, had a history of mental health problems. 
 
 The chase, on Thursday afternoon, stirred panic in the capital and briefly stopped the mechanisms of government. It happened two weeks after a man shot 12 people to death at the Washington Navy Yard. 
 
 Members of the House and Senate, in a standoff over the government shutdown, were ordered to stay in place. One lawmaker was cut off mid-sentence during a speech. A swarm of police startled tourists who were taking in Washington on a summery day. 
 
 Carey, 34, was a dental hygienist living in Stamford, Conn. Details of her background began to emerge in the hours after the episode. 
 
 Dr. Barry Weiss, a dentist, told NBC Connecticut that Carey was working for him in January 2012 when she suffered a fall and missed two to three weeks. He said that she appeared increasingly stressed after an unplanned pregnancy. Relatives have said that she may have suffered postpartum depression. 
 
 Weiss said that he fired her in August 2012 after patients complained that she was too rough. 
 
 Carey was driving a black Infiniti sedan when, just after 2 p.m. ET, she struck a security fence outside the White House. She took off after hitting a Secret Service officer with her car. 
 
 From there, police said, she sped up Pennsylvania Avenue toward the Capitol, reaching 80 mph at one point. Police and the Secret Service stopped her at the foot of the Capitol, but she jammed the car into reverse and took off again as police opened fire. 
 
 Carey led police on a chase around the perimeter of the Capitol and crashed her car outside a Senate office building a few minutes later, police said. The police shot at her, and she died a short time later. The chase was captured on video. 
 
 A Capitol police officer was hurt as he was speeding to confront her and hit a barrier that popped up in the street. The two injured officers were exempt from the government shutdown and required to work but were not being paid. 
 
 Carey had an 18-month-old child, believed to be her daughter, in the car, authorities said. The girl was taken to a hospital and found to be unharmed. She was in the protection of social services Friday. 
 
 Katy Tur of NBC News contributed to this report. 
 
 Slideshow: Capitol car chase puts DC on edge Mark Wilson / Getty Images The U.S. Capitol was placed on lockdown following a car chase involving a woman who attempted to ram a security fence at the White House. Launch slideshow 
 
 This story was originally published on ||||| A woman killed by police today after a high-speed chase through Washington, D.C., that led to a lockdown of Capitol Hill suffered post-partum depression following the recent birth of her daughter, the suspect's mother told ABC News. 
 
 Interested in ? Add as an interest to stay up to date on the latest news, video, and analysis from ABC News. Add Interest 
 
 The woman was believed to be Miriam Carey, 34, a dental hygienist from Stamford, Conn., authorities told the woman's family, according to a family spokesman. 
 
 Police earlier said they were witholding the name of the driver of the car involved in the chase pending positive identification and notification of next of kin. 
 
 Authorities said the woman led police on a chase down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Capitol after ramming a gate at the White House. 
 
 Authorities described Carey has having a "mental illness." 
 
 "She had post-partum depression after having the baby" last August, said the woman's mother, Idella Carey. 
 
 She added, "A few months later, she got sick. She was depressed. ... She was hospitalized." 
 
 Carey had a 1-year-old daughter named Erica, her mother said. Police confirmed that a 1-year-old girl was taken from the car and put in "protective custody." 
 
 READ MORE: Attempt to Ram White House Gate Ends With Female Suspect Dead 
 
 PHOTOS: Capitol Hill Lockdown and D.C. Chase 
 
 Idella Carey said her daughter had "no history of violence" and she did not know why she was in Washington, D.C. She said she believed Carey was taking the little girl to a doctor's appointment today in Connecticut. 
 
 Dr. Steven Oken, her boss of eight years, described Carey as a "non-political person" who was "always happy." 
 
 "I would never in a million years believe that she would do something like this," he said. "It's the furthest thing from anything I would think she would do, especially with her child in the car. I am floored that it would be her." 
 
 A neighbor, Erin Jackson, said she believed Carey lived in the Stamford home with the baby and the girl's father. Asked if in retroscpect, Carey's behavior made sense in light of reports that she suffered a mental illness, Jackson said "absolutely." 
 
 Jackson recognized the black Infinity sedan seen on television from the incident as resembling Carey's car. She said the woman's tires recently were slashed in an incident in Connecticut. 
 
 Police, including FBI and bomb disposal units, surrounded a home in Stamford Thursday evening that authorities say is linked to the investigation, but won't give specifics. Police there said they were awaiting a search warrant from Washington, though 50 people from the apartment building already were being evacuated for the night. 
 
 Cops said Carey eluded police after they stopped her car and drew their guns. When she continued to flee, she drove "very erratically, very dangerously," said Senate Sergeant at Arms Terrance Gainer. 
 
 She ultimately rammed a police car and was shot by police without exiting the car, Gainer said. Two officers, one from the Capitol Police and one from Secret Service, were injured in the incident. 
 
 No weapons were found in the car, police said. 
 
 ABC News' Michael S. James contributed to this report. ||||| Amy Carey-Jones, center, the sister of Miriam Carey, speaks to the news media outside the home of her sister Valarie, second from left, in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn. Law enforcement authorities identified Miriam Carey, 34, as the woman who, with a 1-year-old child in her car, led Secret Service officers and police on a harrowing chase Thursday from the White House past the Capitol, attempting to penetrate the security barriers at both national landmarks before being shot to death, police said. The child survived. 
 
 Oct. 4, 2013 Amy Carey-Jones, center, the sister of Miriam Carey, speaks to the news media outside the home of her sister Valarie, second from left, in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn. Law enforcement authorities identified Miriam Carey, 34, as the woman who, with a 1-year-old child in her car, led Secret Service officers and police on a harrowing chase Thursday from the White House past the Capitol, attempting to penetrate the security barriers at both national landmarks before being shot to death, police said. The child survived. John Minchillo/AP 
 
 Federal agents trying to stop the black Infiniti speeding between the White House and the U.S. Capitol fired seven shots at its unarmed driver, who had a toddler in the car with her, an uncommon tactic that occurred during a highly unusual chase. 
 
 Legislators and other employees told to shelter in place after “two very rapid fire bursts” heard to the north of the Capitol. 
 
 Legislators and other employees told to shelter in place after “two very rapid fire bursts” heard to the north of the Capitol. 
 
 She had a toddler with her, confounding everyone who watched the car crash through barriers and lead police through the heart of high-security Washington. 
 
 Law enforcement officials said the black Infiniti was registered to a 34-year-old mother named Miriam Carey, a dental hygienist from Stamford, Conn. They think it was Carey, with her 1-year-old daughter sitting behind her, who flattened barricades outside the White House, struck officers and then set off at high speed down Pennsylvania Avenue. 
 
 D.C. police confirmed that the driver was shot and killed after careening around the Capitol grounds and crashing at Second Street NE. There was no sign that she was armed, police said. 
 
 Video images showed a young child, her hair in braids, being carried by an officer to the back of a patrol car. 
 
 The initial portrait of Carey that emerged suggested a person unlikely to be found in the center of such violence. Carey, according to public documents, friends and family members, had finished college and established a work history as a dental hygienist. 
 
 Police had a confrontation with a woman in a black car and engaged in a brief car chase with her before shots were fired outside the U.S. Capitol on Thursday. (Thomas LeGro/The Washington Post) 
 
 Her sister, Amy Carey, a Brooklyn nurse, was incredulous when she was reached Thursday afternoon and told what had happened. 
 
 “That’s impossible. She works, she holds a job,” said Amy Carey, who confirmed that her Stamford-based sister drove a black car. “She wouldn’t be in D.C. She was just in Connecticut two days ago, I spoke to her. . . . I don’t know what’s happening. I can’t answer any more.” 
 
 About 11 p.m. Thursday, at least a dozen local police cars, fire trucks and ambulances lined a street in Stamford outside the apartment complex where Miriam Carey reportedly lived. Sections of the complex were cordoned off with yellow crime tape. 
 
 Eric Sanders, an attorney for the Carey family, said outside the Brooklyn home of another sister, Valarie Carey, that the family was struggling to absorb the news. He said he would release an official statement Friday. 
 
 “We have to mend the family first and find out what happened in D.C.,” Sanders said. 
 
 People who knew Carey described her as friendly and dedicated. 
 
 Angela Windley, 33, befriended Carey while both attended Hostos Community College in the Bronx and graduated with an associate’s degree in dental hygiene. Officials at Brooklyn College confirmed that a student named Miriam Carey graduated in 2007 with a bachelor’s degree in health and nutrition science. 
 
 Windley said she and Carey went on a vacation to Cancun together about three years ago but that she had lost touch with Carey in the past two years or so after Carey stopped replying to messages that Windley left on Facebook. 
 
 “She was really just a sweet and nurturing person,” said Sara Vega, a former schoolmate of Carey’s in Brooklyn, where Carey was born and raised. Vega, who now lives in Georgia, said she hadn’t seen Carey in recent years but that the two had been in touch occasionally on Facebook. “I know she had a daughter about a year ago.” 
 
 Windley said she and Carey had attended the same high school but did not become friends until their days at the community college. Carey had four sisters, including one who was a longtime New York police officer. 
 
 Carey “wanted to have a better life,” Windley said. “The neighborhood we both grew up in wasn’t the greatest, and she always talked about getting out.” 
 
 Carey moved to Stamford after “some problems with her landlord,” Windley said, “but the Brooklyn rents were getting so high . . . that’s how she landed in Stamford.” 
 
 Carey was “always very professional” and “very focused,” according to Windley. “She wanted better, always.” 
 
 Windley said she knew of no connections to the District that Carey might have had and had never heard Carey express any opinion about the government. “This is very shocking,” Windley said as she fought back tears during a telephone interview. 
 
 During her friendship with Carey, Windley said she had never witnessed Carey lashing out in anger “beyond, you know, normal girl stuff, like, ‘What is up with her?’ about another girl, but nothing crazy. Some sharp words, that would be it.” 
 
 Carey also had not shown signs of mental illness during the time Windley knew her and “was not one to even talk about politics.” 
 
 Carey did not have many friends, Windley said, and could seem “arrogant. If there was a negative, people said that was it. She could be sort of conceited, like she knew everything.” 
 
 That trait surfaced at school during their training and was off-putting to some of the faculty, Windley said. “But that was the most negative thing you could say about her.” 
 
 Carey also was a good driver with a good sense of direction, Windley said. “She wasn’t one to get all crossed up, she knew maps — I even recall saying that I hoped I became as good a driver as she was, since I can get lost in a box.” 
 
 In a news conference, D.C. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said the incident did not appear to be an accident, noting there was “a lengthy pursuit.” 
 
 Told about the confrontation on Capitol Hill, Windley said: “I would have pulled over, stopped. Why wouldn’t she? Why would she have done this? Why? And why with her daughter in the car? Why would she do something like that?” 
 
 Alice Crites, Jennifer Jenkins, Colum Lynch and Matt Zapotosky contributed to this report.
– Those who knew Miriam Carey, the reported driver of the black Infiniti at the center of yesterday's DC chase, are struggling to believe the news. "That’s impossible. She works, she holds a job," sister Amy Carey tells the Washington Post. "She wouldn’t be in DC. She was just in Connecticut two days ago," though she does have a black car, Amy says. But Carey's mom, Idella, tells ABC News her daughter was suffering from post-partum depression. Miriam gave birth to her daughter last August, Idella Carey says, and "a few months later, she got sick. She was depressed. ... She was hospitalized." (Police confirmed a 1-year-old girl was in the car with Carey when she was killed.) A former classmate says Miriam Carey "was really just a sweet and nurturing person," and a college friend says Carey was "always very professional" and "very focused." She didn't discuss politics, and wasn't one to lose her temper. But DC police chief Cathy Lanier says the situation yesterday didn't seem to be an accident. The Connecticut Post notes that Carey had no criminal record. Now her neighborhood in Stamford, Conn., is flooded with officials: "A full investigation is underway by federal authorities," says the city's mayor. A few more details have emerged: Carey—or someone with the same name—got a BA in health and nutrition from Brooklyn College in 2007. She also had an associate degree in dental hygiene from the Bronx's Hostos Community College. She moved to Stamford in 2009 after living in Brooklyn, close to her family, for years. In 2002, she gained a dental hygiene license from New York state; in 2009, she got one from Connecticut. She ran a temping business out of her Connecticut condo called Experienced Dental Placements. Her condo association sued her last year for unknown reasons, but the suit was dropped. BuzzFeed has an account of what's known so far, with photos.