Evan Edwardsen
/ File photo
SYRACUSE -- The man charged in a standoff with Syracuse police last August has pleaded not responsible by reason of mental disease.
28-year-old Evan Edwardsen waived his right to a trial in Onondaga County Court Tuesday morning.
Edwardsen says he is schizophrenic and was not on his medications at the time of the incident at the Homestead Housing facility on Wyoming Street.
Police say they went to Edwardsen's room and he would only open the door slightly, then tried to shut it on them. Police say he had a grenade in his hand. The grenade was apparently real but not live. Police negotiated with Edwardsen for about ten hours before he came out and was arrested.
This is the second time that Edwardsen has been involved in a standoff with police. In 2009, he was charged with menacing and criminal possession of a weapon after threatening his father with a compound bow-and-arrow. That standoff, on Carnoustie Lane in Manlius, lasted for six hours until police forced their way into the home's basement and took Edwardsen into custody.
Edwardsen is scheduled to be back in Onondaga County Court for sentencing on May 24.
