Man Shoots Self After Standoff

An armed man held four people hostage in a bank for nearly four hours Wednesday in what police described as a suicide and publicity attempt, then shot himself after the hostages ran away.

“He shot himself in the stomach” moments before he was taken into custody from the Seafirst Bank branch, Auburn Police spokeswoman Cheryl Price said.

About an hour after the shooting, the man was in serious condition at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, where he was undergoing surgery for a gunshot wound to the abdomen, hospital spokesman Larry Zalin said.

There was no question about the source of the wound, though rifle-toting police and FBI agents in combat gear surrounded the bank at the height of the crisis.

The man will be transferred to federal custody today, Auburn police Cmdr. Jim Kelly said.

The man released two of his six hostages earlier in the standoff that began about 10:30 a.m. in a commercial area of this south Seattle suburb.

He held a gun to the heads of some hostages - five women and one man, who were all bank employees - but none was hurt, Kelly said.

At about 2:30 p.m., his four remaining captives ran out of the bank, Price said.