9-hour standoff ends with man taken into custody
Armed police were on scene in Winnipeg's Burrows neighbourhood for hours on Saturday
A nine-hour standoff ended with a man being brought out of a home surrounded by police in Winnipeg's Burrows neighbourhood on Saturday.
Earlier in the morning police were executing a search warrant related to a drug and firearms investigation on the 500 block of Sherbrook Street involving a 33-year-old man when they spotted the suspect in a truck driving around the neighbourhood.
Police tried to stop the truck but it fled the area, colliding with a woman riding a bike at Arlington Street and Logan. After hitting the cyclist, the truck rammed into a taxi and kept driving.
Police said the cyclist was brought to hospital with minor injuries.
Soon after, the truck was found abandoned in a back lane on the 1400 block of Magnus Avenue and officers learned that the suspect and a 22-year-old man, who was also in the truck, ran into a nearby house.
'It's very alarming'
Police spokesman Const. Jay Murray said the family inside the house initially didn't even know the two men were hiding inside.
"It's my understanding that the homeowner had met one of the two suspects twice in his life and was connected through of a friend of a family member," Murray said.
When the 22-year-old man ran out of the house it was surrounded by police and the family quickly found out their home had become the base of a standoff.
"It's very alarming to think what, especially the children, would have gone through," Murray said.
Police were able to get the family safely out of the house, Murray said, but the 33-year-old man refused to leave.
The house was surrounded by police, including the Tactical Support Team, and the armoured rescue vehicle pulled onto the property.
Witness says police used flash bombs, megaphone
Jocelynn Stortz, who lives in the area, said she saw officers walking through her neighbourhood holding guns and sniper rifles.
"There were a lot of police officers. There were … undercover ones and they were behind the house and in front of the house, trying to get the guy out of the house," she said.
"They brought a huge megaphone kind of thing and were telling him to get out of the house: You have until 7:30 or they were going to come rushing inside to take him out. But he still refused to come out," she added.
Stortz said at first she was afraid because she didn't know what was going on, but later learned it was a standoff.
"I've never seen something this huge at a house and going on for a couple of hours," she said.
As the hours went on, people were told to stay in their homes and nearby streets were blocked to traffic, she said.
She also saw the officers continue trying to get the man out of the house. She said at one point police pulled a large van onto the property, with a pole attached to it, and smashed some windows open. Police also used two flash bombs, she said.
"They were really loud and, from my perspective, when the second flash bomb went off I saw smoke appear from the top floor and the smoke pouring out of the window," she said.
Man arrested
Then around 7:30 p.m. she said the police started to storm the house.
"[Officers went] in through the front of the house and one of them had a canine as well. So when they rushed inside they got him out of the house and they were walking him with them when the canine was also biting onto his leg and everything," she said.
"They brought him out of the house and put him into the back of a vehicle."
Police said after repeated demands that the man leave the house, he was taken into custody and faces multiple charges.
"The first attempt would be to get this person to remove themselves from the residence safely," Murray said.
"Police, specifically the tactical support team, used a number of methods to try to do so. Ultimately all were negative. This individual refused to co-operate with police."
The 22-year-old man was also found to be the subject of a Canada-wide arrest warrant and he was also arrested.
The investigation is ongoing.
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