Skip to footer

High-speed chase through Los Angeles ends with hostage situation

Los Angeles police engaged an armed carjacker in a 45-minute pursuit that crossed several area cities before the man barricaded himself inside a barbecue restaurant.

|
Bob Riha/Reuters
Released hostages are seen at the scene of an armed hostage standoff in Downey, Calif., on Thursday. Several people were being held hostage in a Los Angeles-area restaurant late on Thursday after a suspected carjacker barricaded himself inside the building following a police chase, law enforcement and media reported.

An armed man involved in a hostage situation in a Los Angeles barbecue restaurant was shot dead on Thursday night, authorities said.

Police stormed the Chris' & Pitt's restaurant in Downey, outside of Los Angeles, to end a two-hour long siege, according to Cmdr. Mike Parker of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. Several shots were fired by police and the armed man. Further investigation will be needed to show if the man was killed by a police bullet or his own.

The hostage situation followed a night of carjacking and high-speed chases.

Police began chasing the man after Lo-Jack, a tracking system for stolen vehicles, detected his stolen car at 6:30 p.m. While the vehicle was being monitored by helicopter, police saw the man leave the first car and carjack a silver sedan at gunpoint, Commander Parker told the Los Angeles Times.

The subsequent chase spanned several cities and lasted nearly 45 minutes. Speeds during the chase reached upwards of 80 mph and it was broadcast by KCAL-TV Channel 9.  The footage shows the armed man engaged in reckless driving, nearly striking a bicyclist, running red lights, and dodging several close encounters with oncoming traffic.

While passing between the cities of Montebello and Monterey Park, the suspect struck at least one vehicle, Parker told the LA Times.

The high-speed chase ended when a California Highway Patrol SUV knocked the vehicle into a spin, which caused it to crash. The man ran out of the vehicle, firing at least one shot.

The man entered the Chris' & Pitt's barbecue restaurant during the dinner rush around 7:45 p.m. At least 80 patrons and employees fled the restaurant, police reported.

The man hed remaining patrons and employees as hostages. Local media reported the number of hostages at a half-dozen. A crisis negotiator was present at the scene, but the situation soon devolved and forced police to enter.

“You could tell by his driving that he had absolutely no concern for the public. He showed it between his driving a stolen car, carjacking a car at gunpoint, shooting his gun. This was a dangerous night for law enforcement and the public,” Parker told the Los Angeles NBC affiliate Channel 4.

This report includes material from the Associated Press.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to High-speed chase through Los Angeles ends with hostage situation
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2015/0911/High-speed-chase-through-Los-Angeles-ends-with-hostage-situation
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe