Police standoff near Main Street continues
Vancouver City Police are now converging on a residence in a sidestreet near Main Street and West 14th Avenue after a long standoff.
The house at 2913 Watson Street was surrounded by police officers over an hour ago, with shotguns and pistols drawn. Police made repeated announcements through a loudhailer, demanding the occupant appear and follow instructions (each message ended with the statement "We're not going away").
Officers watching the crowd gathered at both ends of the cordoned-off street have asked people to stay out of the way of approaching traffic.
Minutes ago, a group of officers climbed the front stairs and broke a front window. Witnesses standing by say that police failed in an attempt to break open the house's front door. A group of officers is now standing on the front porch, reportedly negotiating with an occupant.
UPDATE 2:25 p.m.: A group of six officers continue to stand on the porch of the residence. Three have appeared to don gasmasks. One appears from a distance to be pointing a weapon in a window or door.
UPDATE 2:50 p.m.: Officers wearing gasmasks entered the front door of the residence, apparently after firing tear gas into the building. Moments later they emerged with a man under arrest.
Comments
6 Comments
jenny em
Sep 22, 2013 at 9:11pm
the police officers sprayed the tear gas without warning patrons sitting on the deck of the coffee shop, 49th Parallel, and several people were gassed and left choking and blinded. I have a friend who was among them that reported the police officers standing by to be laughing at them. that's not what I would call serving or protecting. that's what I would call a power trip, breech of code and conduct and downright bullying. I find it disgusting and maddening that these are the people in power. these people are meant to uphold the law and maintain goodness. instead, the gun on their hip turns that kid who pulls the legs off of spiders into something to truly be wary and even afraid of. for shame, Vancouver police. its too goddamn bad we all know that absolutely NOTHING will be done about this. just swept under the rug like hundreds of other misconducts...and this was just tear gas, imagine how much worse it can be and has been. who will police the police?
ger
Sep 23, 2013 at 10:53am
So there were people sitting on the patio watching this unfold and they didn't think to take cover when they saw the police put on their gas masks? What were the cops supposed to do?
get your head outta your ass
Sep 23, 2013 at 1:16pm
Cops are not here for our protection or to serve, they are here to enforce laws that are created by the ELite power hungry corporate greedy pigs that we fakely elected in a fraudulent system to serve the the needs of the the wicked and greedy. Once we all realize this, we will all start to remember how the only power we have left is power in numbers.
Not as stupid you want me to be.
Sep 23, 2013 at 7:22pm
@jenny em, the cops laughed? Seriously, you think we're all stupid to think that & believe? The cops were just having a good time? Well prove it jenny, did you take a video of them laughing? or any of your" progressive" thinking friends? did they take a video of the cops laughing? Come on jenny, we're waiting, proof it, you seen so sure.
danwithatwist
Sep 23, 2013 at 8:36pm
I was one of the people sitting on the patio at 49th Parallel. It was not evident to us at all that the police were about to use gas. It was not until we were already affected by the gas, looked over at the police line, and saw the officers wearing masks and laughing at us that we knew what had happened. From our stance on the patio we could not see the property so we had no idea what was going on, why the police were there, or what was about to happen.
It would have taken less then 2 minutes for the officers to walk over to us, and ask us to leave the patio. Or to ask 49th Parallel to shut the patio down and ask us to leave.
Alan Layton
Sep 24, 2013 at 12:29pm
Sorry but the thought of Main St hipsters getting a whiff of tear gas makes me laugh. I'm sure if the police came over and tried to get this hipsters to leave at least some of them would've put up a struggle and been arrested any ways. The cops were just saving some time. Odd though that this story was not on the TV news that night.