{"id":2350,"date":"2019-05-01T20:26:30","date_gmt":"2019-05-01T20:26:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/westernmirror.com\/?p=2350"},"modified":"2019-05-01T20:27:23","modified_gmt":"2019-05-01T20:27:23","slug":"deadly-standoff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/?p=2350","title":{"rendered":"Deadly standoff"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><em>Father dead, 8 y-o son critical<\/em><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em><strong>Barrington Flemming<\/strong> &#8211; Staff Reporter<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>The usually quite\ncommunity of Comfort Hall, Anchovy in South St. James, is reeling from a four-\nhour hostage crisis, which has left one man dead and his eight-year-old son in\ncritical condition in hospital. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The dead man is 56-year-old taxi operator, Donavon Thompson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The four-hour ordeal began to unfold about 1:30 a.m. on\nTuesday, when a police team went to the Comfort Hall area in search of\nThompson, who was a suspect in a sexual offence case. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Commanding Officer for the St. James Police Division,\nSuperintendent Vernon Ellis, said on arrival at the premises, Thompson\nbarricaded himself in the house and held his eight-year-old son hostage, while\nrefusing the police entry to the house. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&nbsp;Thompson reportedly\npulled the curtains from the windows and made several attempts to set the house\nablaze with the use of a lighter and two gas cylinders. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe fire department, the paramedics, negotiators and the\nSWAT team from the JCF were all on the scene and they all tried to persuade him\nto end the hostage situation. He, however, made a request to see his wife who\nwas in another parish. The police acceded to the request and brought the wife\nto the house at Comfort Hall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&nbsp;Superintendent Ellis\nsaid Thompson\u2019s wife and members of the church he attended, as well as\ncommunity members, pleaded with him to release the son and give up himself up\nto the police but he refused. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>ATTACKED HIS SON<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cInstead, Thompson started to attack his eight-year-old son\nand used a knife to stab him several times to the upper body, during which the\nSWAT team from the JCF gained entry by breaching the front of the premises. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He further explained that the police tried to use less\nlethal options to subdue Thompson, including bean bags but: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&nbsp;\u201cHe continued to\nattack his son, stabbing him, and in a bid to save the child\u2019s life, the police\nresorted to lethal option. Mr. Thompson was injured, and the paramedics who\nwere at the scene transported him and his critically wounded son to the\nCornwall Regional Hospital,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Thompson succumbed to his injuries while his son has been\nadmitted. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe fire department put out the fire and washed down the\nhouse and in the interim, we have since deployed members of the Community\nSafety and Security Branch to Comfort Hall as many residents there are\ndistraught, so we can assist them to cope with this ordeal,\u201d Superintendent\nEllis concluded.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The four-hour ordeal began to unfold about 1:30 a.m. on Tuesday, when a police team went to the Comfort Hall area in search of Thompson, who was a suspect in a sexual offence case<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2351,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[390],"class_list":["post-2350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-state-of-public-emergency"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2350"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2350\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2352,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2350\/revisions\/2352"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/westernmirror.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}