Gun incident in Salem

[Pat McCotter]

'Miscommunication' blamed for incident in Salem

SALEM ? Police are calling a situation that developed yesterday afternoon a "miscommunication."

It started after they received a report a man, who had a handgun, was in a house with one of his small children.

Police blocked off streets around North Policy Road and sent officers into the vicinity yesterday at about 3 p.m, police said. But they then received information that there was not a problem, and the man and his wife were going to walk out of the building.

Police ordered the man to walk out of the house by himself with his hands up, which he did, and no arrests were made.

Police said they were not releasing the names of residents involved in the incident.

[KBCraig]

Wow, that's begging for some elaboration.

"With a handgun in a house with one of his children"?

Ummm... Okay. I'm in a house. With children (okay, one of them is a grown man, 18 and in the Army; but the others are 3 and just-today-turned-16). I don't have "a" handgun, I've got several (plus a couple dozen long arms; I haven't counted lately).

And if a call came into our local 9-1-1 center to that effect, the response would most likely be, " ... and?"

I thought after mvpel's incident, Salem PD was going to start asking relevant questions in response to "man with a gun" calls.

Kevin

[mvpel]

I have three handguns in the house, but my child is 5,000 miles away at the moment.

I wonder if they jumped to the conclusion that it was a hostage situation.