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Video of Hanover St. standoff shows man point rifle at police

Posted at 11:32 PM, Dec 19, 2012
and last updated 2012-12-20 15:34:19-05

RICHMOND, Va (WTVR) - Never seen before video from an intense stand-off in Richmond’s museum district. CBS 6 reporter Jon Burkett captures the images of a man waving and pointing a high-powered rifle at Richmond police and their S.W.A.T. team.

It happened on December 14th on Hanover Avenue in the city’s museum district. Police were called to the neighborhood for a domestic disturbance call.

They tried several times to talk the man out of his apartment peacefully. Around 11:15pm, the man opens the apartment door with the rifle pointed at police.

In the video: you can see the S.W.A.T. team set their sights with laser beams on the suspects arm but they never shoot.

CBS 6 crime expert and retired Chesterfield police captain Steve Neal says, ”every situation is different. Law enforcement only has a fraction of a second to make sense of a situation and react. In this case I can clearly see the officers discipline, training and decision-making were superb.”

The stand-off lasted 7 hours where in the end the suspect took his own life.