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A 7-year-old boy in Norwalk, California, locked himself and his 6-year-old sister in a bathroom and called 911 on March 9, 2010, prompting three armed men holding their parents at gunpoint to flee without injuring anyone or taking any property, authorities said.

The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department said the intruders walked through the family's unlocked front door around 8:30 a.m. after the boy's 6-year-old sister left it open while running out to the car for her lunch box. The men, armed with handguns, told the family they were going to take what they wanted.

The boy, identified only as Carlos, grabbed his sister and a phone and locked the bathroom door behind them. "There's some guy who's going to kill my mom and dad. Can you come, please?" Carlos told sheriff's dispatcher Monique Patino, according to a recording released by the department. "Bring cops, a lot of them, and bring soldiers too."

About 90 seconds into the call, the intruders broke into the bathroom. One grabbed the boy and demanded to know who he had called. When Carlos answered "911," the men fled. Deputies reached the home within three minutes, but the suspects had already left in a green or gray two-door compact car, Sheriff's Sgt. Douglas Jensen said.

Investigators said the neighborhood had seen a string of recent burglaries and could not say whether the family had been targeted specifically or picked at random. The sheriff's department said the suspects had not been located as of the following week, and no arrests in the case were ever publicly reported.

Patino and Carlos met face to face for the first time at a news conference the next day, where he hugged her and gave her a high five. "I felt the fear in his voice, both of them," Patino said, referring also to Carlos' sister. "I'm shaky, I'm nervous, I'm scared. I'm more scared for them, and it was a little unbearable." Patino, the mother of a 7- and an 8-year-old, said she had to take a walk to calm down afterward, not knowing right away how the call had ended.

Capt. Patrick Maxwell of the Sheriff's Department said Carlos' actions likely prevented the home invasion from ending in tragedy. Carlos told reporters he stayed calm because his mother had him practice dialing 911. Asked how he did, she told him, "Excellent." His parents did not attend the news conference; Maxwell said they were still traumatized by the break-in.