Botched Food Order Leads to Texas Standoff

March 21, 2011
A tense standoff that lasted nearly four hours and involved gunfire ended peacefully Sunday evening.

SAN ANTONIO --

A botched food order led to a tense police standoff that lasted nearly four hours on the city's East Side on Sunday evening.

According to Sgt. Chris Benavides, a San Antonio Police Department spokesman, the situation began when a man got angry after employees at a Taco Bell-Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant got his order wrong. The man brandished an assault rifle before leaving the scene, Benavides said.

The officers spotted the man near Interstate 410 and Rigsby Avenue, where they pulled him over, Benavides said.

"As soon as they initiated that traffic stop, the suspect jumped out with his assault rifle, and gunshots were exchanged between the suspect and the officers," Benavides said. One of the rounds fired by the man shattered the window of a patrol car, Benavides said.

Officers tracked the man to a Rodeway Inn on W.W. White Road, where police negotiators tried for four hours to convince him to surrender, Benavides said. During the standoff, the man intermittently fired at officers through the window of his motel room, Benavides said.

Danny Romero, who was staying in a room two doors down from the man, remembered officers calling his room phone and telling him to get on the floor.

"All I could see is metal on the frame of my bed, and figured that's my best protection," Romero said.

Officers told Romero to slowly exit his room about a half hour later and ushered him to safety.

Shortly before 7 p.m., SWAT officers broke the room's window, and tossed in two canisters of tear gas, Benavides said. The man gave himself up shortly after the second canister was deployed.

Police said the man faces three separate charges of attempted murder.

Copyright 2011 by KSAT.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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