Santa Rosa Hostage Standoff Ends; Knife-Wielding Suspect Arrested; Victims Including Small Child Unharmed
SANTA ROSA (CBS SF) -- A tense standoff with a knife-wielding man in Santa Rosa ended early Thursday with the suspect taken into custody and several hostages rescued unharmed.
The Santa Rosa police said officers were dispatched to the 500 block of Apple Creek Lane after a 911 call reported a male suspect inside an apartment brandishing a large knife and holding several individuals hostage.
The 911 call came from a resident in the Sacramento area who was on the phone with tenants inside the apartment. They identified the suspect as Jarrett Cole, a 25-year-old from El Dorado County. Cole had been brought to the apartment earlier in the evening by an acquaintance.
Responding officers learned that Cole was threatening to burn the apartment down and making threats to kill everybody inside. One of the tenants was able to leave the phone connection with the Sacramento resident open as officers responded to the scene.
Through the open phone line, the reporting party could hear Cole acting aggressively, making threats, and referring to himself as "God."
Cole would not allow the tenants to leave, move within the home or communicate with their phones. There was a total of four hostages inside the apartment, including a five-year-old child in a rear room.
When officers arrived on scene, they surrounded the apartment. Within moments, a female resident opened the front door and threw a large knife out onto the lawn area.
She had gained control of the knife after Cole began physically fighting with another male victim inside the home. Cole quickly exited the upstairs apartment and engaged officers along the stairway.
The female tenant was able to run back into the apartment after officers yelled and instructed her to lock her door.
Cole stood along the upper stairway and began making threats to kill every officer on scene. He displayed signs of being under the influence of narcotics and did not have any weapons in his hands at the time.
Officers maintained a short distance as they negotiated with him for approximately fifteen minutes.
At one point, Cole again stated he was going to kill officers on scene and took steps off the stairway towards them. Given his threatening behavior and immediate threat towards officers, Cole was struck one time with a less-lethal foam round to his upper front torso to assist in apprehending him. He was quickly handcuffed and given immediate attention by medical personnel staging at the scene.
Cole was taken to the hospital with minor injuries. None of the hostages were injured.
Investigators said Cole stabbed a television inside the home with the large knife, made threats to hurt the small child, punched a dog in the head and attempted to move a tenant towards a vehicle outside at knife point to flee the area.
He has been booked into Sonoma County Jail on a litany of charges including false imprisonment, assault with a deadly weapon, kidnapping and making criminal threats.
