Courtesy KBAK
BAKERSFIELD, CA (KUZZ) — New information has been released following the hours-long standoff involving hostages at the Chase Bank building in downtown Bakersfield.
The Bakersfield Police Department was first at the scene when Anthony Searles-Harris, 41, entered the building at 17th Street and Chester Avenue last Tuesday afternoon and took ten employees of the Kern County Superintend of Schools Office hostage with a bomb strapped to his chest.
KGET-TV reports police negotiators spent more than ten hours face-to-face with Searles-Harris.
Reporter Connor Dore says Bakersfield police arrived within minutes of getting the call, and negotiators went inside, not knowing what they were walking into.
“There was a door with a partitioned window where they could see the suspect and they were communicating very close, face-to-face,” said Capt. Ryan Kroeker, who oversees and supports the department’s special operations division.
Kroeker said four negotiators were in the building the entire day, with one lead negotiator who stayed in the building even after the FBI took over.
“This is a high-stakes game. Our negotiators and our SWAT team operators were putting themselves within feet the suspect. They were willing to trade their lives and at least be there to help and get this situation resolved peacefully,” said Kroeker.
Negotiators could see Searles-Harris and the hostages, he also tied himself to one hostage during the entire ordeal. Searles-Harris made multiple demands — food and drinks, and the court file of his child sex abuse case, the case that convicted him.
BPD was able to negotiate two hostage’s release.
Kroeker said there were points officers discussed taking a shot to stop Searles-Harris.
“During our tenure there he remained calm, he remained collected, other than his verbal statements didn’t give us any need to take a shot.”
At one point, Searles-Harris asked to see his daughter.
“We spoke with his daughter, she was at the command post for a while and a lot of conversations were taking place as to whether or not we felt that would be advantageous to the end goal, the end state of what we were trying to reach, at least through our negotiations we made the decision that we were not going to introduce it at that point,” said Kroeker.
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