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A violent crime spree in downtown Los Angeles Friday night ended with police shooting and killing a man who had allegedly committed a series of violent crimes before breaking into an apartment and holding a woman hostage.
The spree, which also shut down part of downtown as authorities responded, started shortly after 4 p.m. when police started getting calls reporting a man with a gun committing several crimes around 8th and Broadway.
"What we know now is that the suspect had initially approached a man on the sidewalk near 8th and Broadway," the LAPD said on its official Twitter account. "The suspect held a gun to the man’s face and pulled the trigger. Fortunately the gun did not fire.
LAPD officials said the same man shot at a family of three in a nearby business, grazing the head of a 14-year-old. In addition, they said they tied the man to an attempted carjacking of a woman at 7th and Spring Street and also said he tried to steal a man's bike.
At that point, as police chased him, the man entered an apartment complex at 6th and Main. Surveillance footage showed the man in a "hallway armed with a gun forcing a female to come with him." After an hour-long standoff, SWAT teams entered the building.
Video posted on Twitter by @_teddybomber, taken from a building across from the apartment, shows the man pacing about while his hostage crouched on the floor. As SWAT teams entered the apartment, several shots are heard, prompting the man to grab the woman and drag her about.
In less than two minutes the tense situation comes to an end with officers shooting the man and rushing the hostage out of the apartment. The man died at the scene and the woman was taken to a hospital.
Authorities have not given details on her condition.
