This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2014, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
For more than seven hours, police negotiators pleaded with an armed, distraught man, trying to talk him out of pulling the trigger on the 9mm handgun he had pointed at his head as he sat inside his car at a Lindon parking lot.
But as darkness approached Thursday night, Lindon Police Chief Cody Cullimore said, an army of 70 officers — including Utah County Metro SWAT teams, his own officers and those from neighboring Orem and Pleasant Grove — decided they had to bring the standoff to an end.
"We chose what we believed would be a non-lethal option. We tried putting tear gas into the car," Cullimore said Friday. "That's when he shot himself."
Just before noon Thursday, the 36-year-old Saratoga Springs man had been fired from his job at a business in the area of 300 S. 1250 West in Lindon. Business owners had requested Lindon police be present as they gave him his severance pay, but the exchange "seemed to have been amiable," Cullimore said.
The man walked across the street and got into his car, pulled out the handgun and called his former boss, threatening suicide. Police quickly sealed off the area.
"We were trying to negotiate with him for more than seven hours, by phone, but he wouldn't come out of the car," Cullimore said. "It's a tragedy all around. But he told us, several times, that this was how it would end."
Five nearby businesses with about 100 total employees were essentially locked down for several hours. About 4 p.m., police used an armored SWAT vehicle to block the gunman's view of the businesses and evacuated employees completely.
The chief said the suicidal man's tone during the prolonged conversations remained "flat, monotone."
About 7 p.m., after the man shot himself, police and paramedics rushed him to the hospital, where he was later pronounced dead.
Cullimore said that at no time did the man point the gun at officers.
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