‘Happy Shark Week 2010!’
courtesy of ‘~Daniel The Animal Lover Techie.TaiShan4Ever~’

According to Montgomery County Police, the suspect in this afternoon’s hostage crisis at the Discovery Channel HQ building in Silver Spring, has been shot, and then detained. All hostages have been freed, according to Chief Manger of the Montgomery County Police. The condition of the suspect is not currently known. The hostages are not reported to be injured at this time. This happened at 4:48pm today.

There are devices still in the Discovery Channel building that are being investigated by the Police and Fire/EMS teams. They are suspected to be potentially dangerous and related to the device that was on the suspect’s body.

Chief Manger spoke for approximately five minutes just after 5pm today to announce the conclusion of the hostage situation, and announce the continued operations at Discovery. The hostage-taker was shot by the police when it was concluded that the suspect, reported by many sources to be James J. Lee, was further endangering the hostages to the point where they needed to act. More as this unfolds.

Update: MoCo police radio indicates that they’ve cleared the building of individuals from the roof down to the 2nd floor but the sweep did not include search for devices, so that will have to be done. The active scene is in the lobby where presumably the gunman and hostages are gathered.

Update: As of 5:22p the entire building is continuing to be treated as an active event; Police just refused entry to building engineers who wanted to start resetting the uninvolved section of the building.

Update: TBD states that the gunman is dead.

Update: MoCo police radio indicates that the hostages have been transported to the police station.

Update 5:50pm: Chief Manger and David Levy of Discovery Communications (no relation to our Dave Levy) are speaking now outside the building. They are reporting four potential devices are still in the building, two boxes and two backpacks, that are suspected to be explosives. During the situation, the Montgomery County police were able to observe Lee with a camera, and moved in when he began to threaten a hostage with a firearm.

Update 6:00pm: Discovery intends to open up tomorrow for business and get back to work.

Update: 6:05pm: Montgomery County Bomb Squad, along with the Capitol Police Bomb Squad, will now be sweeping the building.

Tom Bridge

I live and work in the District of Columbia. I write at We Love DC, a blog I helped start, I work at Technolutionary, a company I helped start, and I’m happy doing both. I enjoy watching baseball, cooking, and gardening. I grow a mean pepper, keep a clean scorebook, and wash the dishes when I’m done. Read Why I Love DC.