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Update [2:55]: Chris Brown stepped out of the house around 2:30, but has not been arrested. He is speaking to police with his lawyer Mark Geragos.
Police entered Chris Brown's home just before 1 p.m. Tuesday, following an hours-long standoff while authorities waited for a search warrant. A warrant was finally obtained just after 12:30 p.m. According to an LAPD representative, Brown has not been arrested and it remains unclear if he will be. We will update this post as the situation evolves.
"Until everybody is interviewed—witnesses, all potential people that were in that residence—until they are interviewed... we cannot provide you with any more information on what actually occurred...,'' Los Angeles Police Department Lt. Chris Ramirez told City News Service.
The trouble began around 3:15 a.m., when an unnamed woman called 9-1-1 to say she had been threatened by the singer, who was allegedly brandishing a gun. According to the L.A. Times, police officers responded and attempted to enter the house, but Brown told them to obtain a search warrant.
The standoff continued for several hours, with a SWAT team and Brown's high-profile lawyer Mark Geragos heading over to the home just after 9 a.m., while Brown shared a series of profanity-laden videos on Instagram, saying he had been asleep most of the night and done nothing wrong.
Sometime before 10 a.m. Brown allegedly threw a duffel bag out the window from which police retrieved weapons and drugs, according to TMZ, who report that the singer told the police to "Come and get me" and he threw the bag out the window.
The scene near the house of #ChrisBrown. #LAPD here investigating a call of a woman needing help. @KNX1070 @CBSLA pic.twitter.com/vanH3cv5L8
— Jon Baird (@KNXBaird) August 30, 2016
Despite the 9-1-1 call, police were likely unable to the enter the home until they obtained the warrant because the woman who called for help had already exited the home before calling 9-1-1, meaning she wasn't in immediate danger.
"That's the whole point of the 4th Amendment warrant requirement, that you need a warrant before you enter unless you have an emergency. For instance, if he was assaulting her at the time, if he was threatening to kill himself with the gun, if he was pointing the gun out the window—if something was happening with some immediacy, then they could enter," Stan Goldman, a law professor at Loyola Law School (and Mark Gerago's former professor, natch) told LAist.
"Otherwise, you're supposed to get a warrant to make sure that a judge intervenes and you're not just breaking into people's homes," Goldman explained.
Baylee Curran, the woman who was allegedly threatened by Chris Brown and called the police, told TMZ that an "older gentleman" was at the house selling diamond necklaces and watches, and that the incident occurred after she admired a diamond cross necklace. Curran, who was Miss California Regional 2016, told TMZ that Brown then pulled his gun out, waved it at her, and told her to "get the eff out." Brown's team tried to get Curran to sign a non-disclosure agreement before leaving but she refused. Curran alleges that Brown's team tried to prevent her from retrieving her cellphone and shoes (she had previously been in a hot tub) unless she signed the NDA.
