It was a tense few hours for all those involved. Butte County Sheriff Deputies went to a home on Temple Circle to serve an eviction notice, but once inside, were confronted by Howard Adams holding his shotgun.
This is how the whole thing ended around three o'clock Wednesday afternoon. Six hours earlier, officers with an eviction notice in hand broke the lock off Howard Adams front door. They were greeted by the distraught resident holding a shotgun. " We backed out and contacted the S.W.A.T. Team" said Sergeant Bryan Marshall with the Butte County Sheriff's Office.
S.W.A.T Team negotiators tried to communicate with Adams using a P.A. System. They fired tear gas rounds into the home and were forced to call Butte County Cal Fire after seeing white smoke coming from inside. Neighbors on both sides of the property got out safely despite the fact Adams had fired more than a dozen rounds in every direction. There was also word that Adam's wife recently passed away and that his home was being foreclosed on. The standoff finally came to an end after a second round of teargas was fired into the home. " After we deployed an amount of gas inside the residence and basically pushed him from inside the residence to another area" explained Sheriff Jerry Smith.
S.W.A.T. Team members then moved in and were able to apprehend Adams near the garage. Sheriff deputies tell Action News the standoff ended peacefully in part because of the use of the S.W.A.T Team's bomb robot which allowed them to get close the the home, break windows and communicate with the suspect.
