politics
Father and son arrested after holding two federal workers hostage in northern California forest
A father and his adult son were taken into custody after holding two U.S. Forest Service employees at gunpoint inside a trailer near Gumboot Lake. The standoff lasted more than 15 hours and involved multiple law enforcement agencies.
Jul 17, 5:43 PM·1m read2 sources
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A father and his adult son were arrested Friday after holding two U.S. Forest Service employees hostage inside a trailer near Gumboot Lake in Siskiyou County, federal prosecutors said. The incident occurred in a remote section of the Shasta-Trinity National Forest north of Redding. Authorities closed the area around the lake during the standoff.
Timeline of the standoff A call came in around 10 a.m.
Thursday to the Siskiyou County sheriff’s office reporting the hostage situation, Sheriff Jeremiah LaRue said. Deputies arrived around noon and used drones to locate the trailer and begin communicating with the suspect. Negotiations started at 4:20 p.m. Thursday. The two workers were released at 1:50 a.m. Friday. The father surrendered along with his adult son after the workers were freed.
Law enforcement response Local, state and federal agencies responded with a SWAT team, sniper unit, bomb unit and additional personnel. An FBI hostage rescue team was flown from Quantico, Virginia, to assist. FBI Acting Special Agent in Charge Brian Tosh confirmed the team’s deployment at a Friday press conference.
Officials said the suspects had no prior history with local law enforcement. Charging documents were being prepared, and United States Attorney Eric Grant said he expects a federal magistrate judge to sign them. The father faces federal kidnapping charges.
Authorities are still investigating a motive. The father stopped communicating with negotiators at one point during the standoff.
““It was a large incident and I’d like to tell you it’s probably the smoothest thing I’ve seen in years.” — Sheriff Jeremiah LaRue, Siskiyou County In 2022 the father was accused of a hate crime for allegedly harassing landlords of Russian and Ukrainian descent in Washington state, according to the Bellingham Herald. That case was dismissed after he could not be admitted to a state psychiatric facility. The Whatcom County Sheriff’s Office described him at the time as having a “spiraling mental health condition.””
