ROSEVILLE, Minn. – Police in a Minneapolis suburb took a man into custody Thursday whom they believe took a woman hostage with a sawed-off shotgun at an office building.
Roseville police got a report about 1 p.m. that a man with a gun had taken a hostage at the three-story building in a heavily trafficked area, at one point holding the gun up to the woman's head. Authorities evacuated the building and locked down the nearby Brimhall Elementary School.
Acting Roseville Police Chief Rick Mathwig said officers arrived at the scene and almost immediately seized a man who matched the description of the gunman. No shots were fired.
Mathwig said officers are trying to verify that the suspect they seized is the gunman, and that a weapon had not yet been found. He said officers did find a bag that had been discarded in the snow.
Two SWAT teams were searching the building. Not long after officers took the man into custody, members of a SWAT team found the woman taken hostage barricaded in a room. Mathwig said she appeared to be uninjured, and was being interviewed by investigators.
Jen Dyrdahl of Edina, who works in the accounting office at A'viands, a food service company in the building, said she was working when a colleague told her the building was surrounded by officers with their guns drawn.
"That was pretty surreal and scary," Dyrdahl said.
Dyrdahl said she saw police take a man in a long black coat into custody. Mathwig said several people were taken into custody around the same time, but that police believe one of them was the gunman.
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