Police shoot hostage-taker at Mexican consulate in Los Angeles
By Laura Wides
ASSOCIATED PRESS
10:26 a.m. November 9, 2004
LOS ANGELES – A man holding a woman hostage outside the Mexican consulate was shot and wounded by police Tuesday. The woman escaped unharmed.
Officers responding to a report of a kidnapping in progress confronted a suspect outside the consulate and shots were fired, said Sgt. Catherine Plows. She did not know if any other hostage-takers remained in the building. After the shooting, a SWAT team was preparing to enter the building.
The wounded man was taken to a hospital and his condition was not immediately known.
The man had a large homemade sign, written in English, attached to his body. It was not clear what the sign said.
A videotape recorded by Telemundo showed the black-clad man, his arm around the woman's neck, leave a building and back down a sidewalk as police closed in.
The man suddenly collapsed backwards to the ground and officers pulled the woman away as others pointed their guns at him. Officers picked up the man and rushed him away.
The area around the consulate began about 8:30 a.m., said Officer Kristi Sandoval, a Police Department spokeswoman.
Police cordoned off several blocks around the building in the MacArthur Park neighborhood and ambulances and fire trucks gathered nearby.
A telephone call to the consulate's press office went unanswered and the Mexican embassy in Washington, D.C., had no immediate comment or details.
makes for a happy ending. Hopefully the trial will be avoided by his untimely passing....
He came to do a job that Americans don't want to do.