A gun-toting, mentally ill woman triggered an hours-long standoff with police after pulling a lawn chair from her car and planting herself in the middle of a busy Texas highway, authorities said.
The bizarre incident unfolded Thursday when the 64-year-old woman spun her car around and “intentionally” slammed into an 18-wheeler on Interstate 45 in Spring around 1:30 p.m., according to the Harris County Sheriff’s Office.
She then got out of her car and sat in the central southbound lane of the freeway, clutching a .38 revolver.
“She persistently kept it to her face, her throat, her head, therefore making it very difficult for us to approach her and take the gun away,” Sheriff Ed Gonzalez told reporters during a press conference, shared by Fox 26 Houston.
“It was a very delicate situation throughout the whole ordeal. She has some mental illnesses that she’s dealing with so there’s no rationality as far as what’s taken place. There is some history of psychosis, so that’s to be determined.”
The five-hour impasse forced police to shut down both sides of the highway, backing up traffic for miles as officers tried to reason with the troubled woman, who sat calmly in the road dressed in all blue, photos taken by KWTX showed.
A crisis negotiator was called to the scene, and the woman’s daughter later arrived to help stop her mother from doing something “foolish” — a move police said helped defuse the tense situation.
“We allowed her to speak to her daughter to let her know her daughter was safe,” Gonzalez said, noting that the unstable female, whose identity was not released, was “in-and-out” of sorts during the mental health crisis.
“That was something that kept her here with us from doing something foolish. Once she realized her daughter was here, she was safe, she was going to be allowed to see her again, it got better at that point.”
The distressed mother eventually surrendered, reportedly embracing the negotiator before being taken into custody and transported to a local hospital for evaluation, police said.
The truck driver involved in the crash was also unharmed.
Gonzalez called the outcome a “win for everybody.”
“Someone’s mother, grandmother is coming home tonight, maybe not tonight, after she gets some help,” he said, noting the woman could face some citations for the deliberate wreck.
“But they’re not injured, they’re not dead. We didn’t have to use force to take her into custody. She’s able to get the help she needs and that’s a win for everybody.”
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