Gunman Holds Day-Care Kids Hostage In Texas Man Asks To Talk To Wife, Who Works At Center; Some Children Released After Phone Negotiations

A lone gunman was holding an unknown number of children and several adults hostage inside a Plano day-care center Wednesday night, police said.

Some children were released about 7 p.m. after telephone negotiations between police and the hostage-taker, and police said there have been no reports of shots or injuries in the standoff.

The problems began about 3:15 p.m. at the Rigsbee Child Development Center just north of Dallas.

Some parents were being sequestered in the A.H. Meadows Elementary School nearby, awaiting word of their children. Family members, friends and residents of the east Plano neighborhood waited outside the school, some praying and crying.

“It’s very emotional inside the school,” said Carl Duke, a Plano police spokesman.

Outside the school, a woman fell to her knees sobbing when she learned her granddaughter was inside.

“Oh my God! Oh my God!” she screamed in tears.

Police officers kept her away from the center.

“It’s not your granddaughter in there,” she yelled.

Margot Udelhoven’s 1-year-old daughter, Addyson, was one of an unknown number of children who were released from the day-care center early in the standoff.

“I don’t want to blame the day-care center. They didn’t do anything wrong,” she said. “When something like this happens, you just don’t know. I just hope the kids get out OK.

“Why would someone do this? These are innocent children.”

Udelhoven has two other children, 2 and 4 years old, who also were in the center. They, too, were released.

Police have not announced the identity of the hostage-taker, but friends and family members described him as the owner of a janitorial service. They said the man is in his early 30s and has a wife who works at the day-care center.

The man demanded to speak to his wife, police said.

The gunman’s wife fled the center when he arrived, said a friend, Oretha Griggs.

Duke said the man had robbed an individual outside the nearby Plano Bank & Trust at 2:50 p.m. Wednesday. Then, soon afterward, police were called to the day-care center on a report that a man armed with a handgun had burst into the school.

Two of the gunman’s children, ages 4 and 8, were inside the center, an employee said.

Griggs, who said her brother’s wife is related to the gunman’s wife, described the gunman as basically a kind man. “I don’t know what made him flip,” she said. “This is out of character for him. He is a kind person. He hangs around my family all the time.”

Friends said the gunman and his wife have four children.