Standoff on Bryden and Houghton

(BRIE WELTON / iNFOnews.ca)

KELOWNA - Bryden Road in Rutland was the scene of a tense stand-off Monday night that started hours earlier as an assault, then triggered a car jacking and next a dramatic police chase.

RCMP say that the Southeast District Emergency Response Team  took a 40-year-old suspect  of a crime spree into custody from a Bryden Road home not long  after 9 p.m. and area residents were given the go-ahead to return to their homes an hour later, roughly  five hours after the street was first blocked off by police. 

The situation started with a call to 911 indicated indicating there was an assault with a weapon in the 100-block of Arab Road in Kelowna. Police have since learned that the Arab Road property owner was allegedly stabbed, when he confronted the suspect. The stabbing victim has since been taken to hospital with what are believed to be non-life threatening in nature, said Cpl. Jesse O'Donaghey, in a press release.

Police began searching for the suspect who they believed fled the area in a stolen vehicle taken during an alleged carjacking. The female victim of the carjacking incident was also transported to hospital by BC Emergency Health Services, for treatment of injuries believed to be non-life threatening in nature.

“Kelowna RCMP front line officers spotted the stolen vehicle and with public safety in mind, engaged in attempts to stop the vehicle,” said Cpl. Jesse O’Donaghey, Media Relations Officer for the Kelowna RCMP.  “The suspect abandoned the stolen vehicle after it collided with a fire hydrant on Bryden Road near Highway 33."

Officers chased the suspect on foot, who ran into and barricaded himself inside an empty nearby home.

Four hours into the police event, the dozen or so people who had been locked out of their homes, heard two loud bangs. That seemed to signal the beginning of the end of the stand off.

The RCMP Emergency Response Team and faces a number of potential criminal charges following a lengthy stand-off with police in Kelowna. He remains in police custody at this time.

The Kelowna RCMP General Investigation Section has assumed conduct of the ongoing related investigations. Any witnesses who have not yet spoken to police are asked to call the Kelowna RCMP at 250-762-3300.

— With files from Brie Welton

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