Trending
VALLEY GROVE — A Valley Grove man was arrested without incident after a two-hour police standoff Thursday afternoon.
The small neighborhood near Submarine Road off U.S. 40 was central to the standoff that stopped traffic between 12:30-2:45 p.m., as Ohio County Sheriff's deputies were joined by West Virginia State Police and Triadelphia police in addressing the situation.
Around 2:20 p.m., a loud 'bang' was heard, and shortly after police radios announced an "all secure." The man who had barricaded himself in his basement was visible being escorted by several officers to a squad car, where he was taken away.
Ohio County Chief Deputy John Schultz said the Sheriff's Office was not immediately able to identify the man, due to Sheriff Tom Howard being out of town at a conference, and that details immediately following the standoff were sparse. However, he said that officers had responded to a domestic disturbance when they believed they were under attack.
"We had a physical domestic call — once units were on scene, they were talking to the female half, when they heard what they thought was a gunshot go off," Schultz said. "The male half would not come out of the residence. … We negotiated for about two hours, and that went nowhere. We finally made the decision that we had to make entry to resolve the situation that was going on, and we took him into custody without any problems."
No one was injured, and the man was taken to be medically cleared while detectives worked the scene.
Schultz said he wished to respect the privacy of the other person involved in the domestic, and did not identify which home the incident occurred in.
He added that a more complete statement would be issued upon Howard’s return.