Updated 11:50 AM
SYRACUSE -- Syracuse Police say a gunman who fired on officers and took seven hostages late Sunday night is dead, and all of his hostages were rescued.
The incident began just after 10:00 Sunday night when police responded to an armed robbery in progress at an apartment above a store in the 200 block of North Geddes Street. Sgt. Tom Connellan of the Syracuse Police Department tells Action News that the suspect barged into the front apartment of the building, assaulted the three occupants, and moved them to the attic. When police officers arrived on the scene, Chief Gary Miguel says they spotted the suspect in a second floor window armed with a gun. Miguel says the gunman opened fire on police, and police fired back.
Police also learned through phone calls from inside the building that there were seven people inside, including the initial three hostages. Those three were able to make their way out of the attic and to a second apartment where they met up with the other four individuals. With the assistance of an armored vehicle from the Onondaga County Sheriff's Department, officers were able to approach the building and get six of those hostages out.
At approximately 4:00 AM, police received a call from the seventh person in the building, who had remained in the attic. That person told police that the gunman had been shot. Police entered the building, rescued the seventh person, and found the suspect dead in a stairwell. Chief Miguel says he won't know until after an autopsy whether the gunman was killed by police or took his own life.
The three hostages who were beaten by the gunman were taken to area hospitals for treatment. Their injures are not believed to be life threatening.
The gunman's name has not yet been released.
