So, at Google Maps I found this map. Lantana Road runs alongside the Palm Beach County Park Airport. Could there be a police action near the airport? Wasn't that the airport that the 9/11 hijackers trained at?
Just speculation, I know.
-PJ
Here's the story from The Palm Beach Post:
Knife-wielding sex offender arrested after 6-hour standoff
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 08, 2007
A fugitive sex offender kept a mobile-home park near Greenacres under siege for nearly six hours Sunday, barricading himself in his home with a knife as dozens of Palm Beach County sheriff's deputies swarmed outside.
The standoff began with a squabble between Juan Antonio Mercado and his girlfriend over money, authorities said, and ended at 4:55 p.m. when deputies found the 41-year-old man cowering under a bed.
Deputies subdued him with one shot of a Taser, then took him to a hospital for psychiatric evaluation, Sgt. Pete Palenzuela said. Mercado faces a felony charge of failing to register as a sex offender, plus other charges likely to stem from the siege.
The standoff drew about 40 deputies to the Lake Worth Village mobile home park, along with county Fire-Rescue crews. The deputies included camouflaged SWAT officers as well as the bomb squad, which deployed its remote-controlled robot to get a look at the barricaded home.
Mercado was required to register as a sex offender because of a 1994 attempted-sodomy case from Chautauqua, N.Y., according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. But he "absconded" from the Greenacres address he had listed, the FDLE said, and deputies had a warrant for his arrest.
Mercado had been arrested in October 2003 in Palm Beach County on a charge of failing to register as a sex offender, but authorities did not prosecute him then, according to FDLE records.
During Sunday's standoff with the deputies, Mercado threatened that "he's going to kill himself if they try to come in," said Annette Jones of Boynton Beach, a friend who spoke to him by phone. "They're going to take him or he's going to take them, or he's going to take himself.
"He's a great guy," Jones added. "He's got a big heart."
Neighbors in the mobile-home park were less sympathetic, complaining they couldn't leave their community throughout the siege and had no idea a sex offender was living among them. Authorities evacuated 11 homes immediately around Mercado's.
"We don't need people like that here because we've got kids," said Rose Schmitz, 53.
Deputies originally went to the home at 4653 Nancy Drive about 11:15 a.m. after Mercado's live-in girlfriend, Lori M. Weiser, made a whispered call to 911, Palenzuela said. That call followed an argument between the two over $1,000 that Mercado claimed Weiser owed him, the spokesman said.
Weiser escaped from the house, but Mercado pulled a knife and refused to surrender, Palenzuela said. Deputies also believed he might have had a flare gun and said he threatened to burn down the house.
"You want to be cautious about these things," Palenzuela said. "Better safe than sorry."
Staff writer Nicole Janok contributed to this story.
I hope this solves one lingering mystery from yesterday.
-PJ