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Standoff ends with suspect fatally shooting self
Emily Bittner and David J. Cieslak
The Arizona Republic
Nov. 19, 2004 12:50 PM
Four hostages held at gunpoint inside a central Phoenix drugstore were free Thursday night after a standoff that forced a school to lock down and snarled rush-hour traffic, authorities said.
The hostages were not harmed during the two-hour standoff, which ended when the 45-year-old suspect, James Alan Parker, shot himself in the head, said Detective Tony Morales, a Phoenix police spokesman. Parker died later at St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center.
Investigators believe that Parker shot himself while sitting near the store's pharmacy as the hostages huddled behind a nearby counter. Minutes earlier, the man was ingesting pills from the pharmacy and had apparently fired a shot at police through a store window, Morales said. No officers were injured. advertisement
According to court records, Parker has a Maricopa County conviction for possession of dangerous drugs. He was originally placed on probation, but he was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison on Aug. 28, 2001, after the court found that he had violated the terms of his probation. DOC records show that he was released from custody on July 23, 2003.
Parker also has a Pinal County conviction for possession of drug paraphernalia. He served a prison term for this violation at the same time as the Maricopa County crime.
The hostage incident Thursday began at 3:30 p.m. with a botched robbery inside a crowded Walgreens store at Seventh Street and Camelback Road. Employees and customers bolted through the store's front door as the robbery began to unfold.
Deborah Eastman, who was inside the Walgreens when the standoff started, said instincts took over as she realized the store was being overtaken.
Eastman, who owns an insurance company, simply expected to run into the pharmacy and pick up the car keys she left on a counter.
Instead, she urged 14 others inside the store to flee after one of the pharmacists warned her to get out.
At first, as she stood at the pharmacy counter, Eastman didn't understand what she was witnessing.
She saw a pharmacist standing with his back to her facing a rack of medicine. She said the gunman, described as a thin man dressed in raggedy clothes, was standing next to him, also with his back to Eastman.
"I could hear the man who was holding them hostage say, 'I just want something for the pain,' " Eastman said.
Eastman didn't see the man's gun, but she said it appeared he was holding one against the pharmacist's back.
A female assistant and another pharmacist also were trapped behind the counter.
The pharmacist mouthed to her, "Get away," she said.
That's when Eastman put it all together.
She ran to the front of the store to tell cashiers that the pharmacists were being taken hostage.
"When it was happening, I just knew I had to alert them and get out myself," she said.
About six customers were waiting in line and an additional eight employees were still in the store, she said.
Everyone except the four hostages managed to escape.
A 19-year-old male employee who was initially trapped inside the Walgreens walked out the front door about an hour after the standoff began. It remained unclear late Thursday whether the gunman freed the employee or if he managed to escape.
Lanae Muldrow, manager of a Chevron gas station across the street from the Walgreens, said she watched through the windows as the gunman ran through the drugstore and dove to the ground at one point. Muldrow said she was overjoyed when the remaining three hostages calmly walked out of the store.
"It was such a relief," she said. "Thank God they got out."
The hostages declined to comment when contacted outside the store.
Negotiators from the Phoenix police Special Assignments Unit, the city's equivalent of a SWAT team, were in contact with the gunman on and off throughout the incident, Morales said.
Xavier College Preparatory, just south of the Walgreens, was put on lockdown. Some students remained inside the school, although class already had been let out.
Police shut down Seventh Street and Camelback during the standoff, hampering rush-hour traffic and leaving motorists to seek other routes through the neighborhood.
Reporter Pat Kossan contributed to this article.
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