A Super Bowl argument led to a gun being drawn, then to a standoff with police.
The incident occurred shortly before 7 p.m. Sunday on Cedar Hill Avenue.
Here’s what happened, according to police spokesman Officer David Hartman:
A man called 911 to say a man with whom he’d been arguing (about the Super Bowl) at a party “pulled out a pistol and held it to his head.” The victim fled. Meanwhile, the alleged gunman “was pacing in front of the house with the gun still in his hand.”
Cops arrived; the man ran inside the house, closed the door. Cops and dispatchers phoned him to ask him to come back out. “One call got him to open the door but only for a minute until he changed his mind and retreated.” Officers didn’t know if any hostages were inside with the man.
SWAT officers responded; cops closed the road in front of the house. A hostage negotiator, using a megaphone, coaxed the man outside after “six or seven minutes,” and “he was taken into custody without further incident.” No one else was inside the house. No one was hurt. Police charged the man, who’s 36, with second-degree threatening and breach of peace as well as criminal possession of body-armor and a firearm.
This ended well and a lot better than it easily could have. It doesn't take much for a silly argument to morph into a fatal error, especially when there is a gun and, one suspects, some kind of intoxicant involved.
For the police: Good for you and thank you from a citizen and, one suspects, from those who care about the people involved.