Police In Standoff With Alleged Bank Robber: Might Have Bomb: UPDATE
UPDATE:
Suspect in San Diego bank robbery in custody after standoff
Situation is ongoing: Updates to follow…..
CHULA VISTA — An alleged bank robber led police on a road chase Thursday from San Ysidro to Chula Vista, where he pulled over outside an apartment building and threatened to detonate a bomb he claimed to be carrying.
The pursuit began about 11:40 a.m., a few minutes after a man robbed a Washington Mutual office in the 400 block of West San Ysidro Boulevard while threatening to detonate an explosive device, according to San Diego police.
The man fled to the north at high speed in a red Ford Explorer, at times driving on the wrong side of roads and getting into at least one collision.
As an SDPD helicopter and ground units tailed him, the alleged robber sped along Industrial Boulevard, then turned onto Palomar Street and continued fleeing to the west a short distance before turning onto Trenton Avenue, a dead-end street, and pulling into a parking lot.
Officers surrounded the area and ordered the man to surrender. He refused, staying inside the parked SUV, threatening to detonate his supposed bomb and saying police would “have to kill him,” a dispatcher said.
Authorities cleared people out of the immediate area near Palomar Street, shut down nearby streets and prepared to deploy a SWAT team around the parking lot where the standoff was taking place.
The man also may have been responsible for a second bank robbery that occurred within minutes of the Washington Mutual heist and a short distance away on the same street, officials said.
He claimed to be carrying pepper spray as well as a bomb, according to police.
10News has learned that nearby Harborside Elementary School was placed on precautionary lockdown due to the situation.
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