Hostage scare shuts parts of Ballard

Seattle

Seattle police cordoned off parts of Ballard for several hours Saturday while they investigated a report that a man was suicidal and holding his 6-year-old daughter hostage in his apartment. Police spokeswoman Debra Brown said police received the call around 1:30 p.m. from the man's estranged wife, who feared he had a weapon. When police got no response from the apartment in the 3000 block of Northwest Market Street, the SWAT team went to the scene.

Eventually, hostage negotiators determined that the girl was safe and was not with her father, and that he was not in the apartment or in the Seattle area, Brown said.

Razor-clam digging OK at 4 beaches

State fish and wildlife officials are giving diggers a chance to harvest razor clams at four Washington coast beaches over the next week.

Long Beach, Twin Harbors, Mocrocks and Kalaloch beaches will all be open for razor-clam digging from noon to midnight Friday and Saturday. Twin Harbors will also remain open next Sunday.

The decision to sanction the digs came after shellfish managers for the state Department of Fish and Wildlife received marine toxin tests that confirmed clams at all four beaches are safe to eat.

Copalis Beach will remain closed due to a low number of clams for harvest.

"If weather and surf conditions cooperate, clam diggers should be able to harvest a limit of nice, fat razor clams in relatively short order," said Dan Ayres, state coastal shellfish manager.

Diggers may take no more than 15 razor clams and must keep the first 15 taken regardless of size or condition. A license is required for anyone 15 or older.

Man surrenders after standoff

A 46-year-old man armed with a sword surrendered peacefully Friday after a two-hour standoff with police.

Kent police said officers went to the Green Acre trailer park after the man's wife called and said her husband was angry, agitated and armed with a sword. She said he suffered from bipolar disorder and had not taken his medication.

Police evacuated the woman and her adult daughter and surrounded the trailer where the man had barricaded himself. They tried without success to flush him out by spraying a chemical agent into the trailer.

After two hours, negotiators re-established phone contact with the man and persuaded him to give himself up, police said.

Olympia

Casino compact gets endorsement

The state Gambling Commission has endorsed a casino compact with the Spokane Indian tribe, a deal that will clear the way for expansion of tribal gambling across Washington if it wins final approval.

Gov. Christine Gregoire and the federal government are expected to OK the pact, which will allow the Spokanes to operate up to five casinos, with up to 4,700 video gambling machines and higher wagers allowed at some tables.

In the name of equity, the state will allow similar expansion for other tribes, commission members and the governor's office said after the 6-3 vote on the Spokane compact.

"Within a month, we will move to amend the other tribes' compacts, providing largely the same features as the Spokane agreement," said Tom Fitzsimmons, the governor's chief of staff and an expert on tribal relations.

Statewide, the number of gambling machines at tribal casinos could rise from 18,225 to about 25,000, including the Spokane machines and modest increases at the other locations, he said. Most tribes will be held to their current two-casino maximum, he said.

The deal will be ready for the commission's March 9 meeting, he said. Ratification of the Spokane pact by the U.S. Interior Department could take a year, he said.

The Spokanes are the last tribe in Washington operating without a compact with the state. Twenty tribes operate 25 casinos, generating $1.2 billion a year in revenue.

Kent

Woman found dead in ditch near trail

A woman was found dead Saturday morning near the Interurban Trail, police said.

A friend told police the woman was homeless and that she had been drinking with him Friday night. He said he found her unconscious and partly underwater in a drainage ditch the next morning, tried unsuccessfully to revive her and then flagged down a police officer.

Police said the woman was about 50 years old. There were no signs of foul play.

The woman is believed to have lived in south King County for several years. She has not been positively identified. An autopsy is scheduled this week.

Jamestown, N.D.

Yakima soldier remembered

A Yakima man who was killed while serving in Iraq was remembered by family and friends Saturday as a patriot and a leader.

Army Reserve Maj. Alan Johnson, 44, a North Dakota native, died on Jan. 26. Military officials said a roadside bomb detonated near his Humvee in Muqdadiyah, killing him and injuring four others.

"Alan lived and breathed his service to God, his family and his country every day," Maj. Gen. David Sprynczynatyk, commander of the North Dakota Guard, said during Saturday's memorial service.

Johnson specialized in Army engineering when he joined the Guard in North Dakota, and he was a member of the Washington National Guard before transferring to the Army Reserve. He worked as a county corrections officer in Yakima.

Eugene, Ore.

Man improving after shot to head

A man shot in the head when he was apparently mistaken for an animal while he was snorkeling in a river near the Oregon coast is improving, his wife said.

John William Cheesman, 44, of Springfield, underwent eight hours of surgery Thursday to remove shrapnel and bone fragments from his face, said his wife, Shelley Cheesman.

"He's doing really well," she said. "The bullet hit in front of his right ear, where the bone is the most dense. It just fragmented and didn't go into his brain."

Douglas County sheriff's deputies have charged William Roderick, 60, of Reedsport with assault, being a felon in possession of a firearm, and possession of methamphetamine and marijuana. Roderick was being held at the Douglas County Jail in Roseburg.

Deputies said Roderick told them he thought Cheesman was a large rodent called a nutria swimming in the Smith River near Reedsport and shot at him with a .22-caliber rifle from the deck of a friend's riverfront home Tuesday.

Cheesman swam to the shore and yelled for help. Roderick and another man came to his aid in a boat.

Kent

Prostitution sting nets 11 arrests

Kent, Tukwila and SeaTac police arrested four suspected prostitutes and seven johns in a joint sting operation Friday on Pacific Highway South.

During the four-hour operation, police said, two undercover female officers posed as prostitutes, and plainclothes officers arrested the men who approached them and offered money for sex. At the same time, undercover male officers posed as potential customers to attract, then arrest, prostitutes.

A Kent police spokesman said similar operations are likely in the near future.

Seattle Times staff and news service reports.