LOS ANGELES (CNN) — Los Angeles police handcuffed a man outside a Trader Joe’s, bringing an apparent end to an incident in which a man barricaded himself inside the grocery store for hours after running from police. “We have successfully taken the suspect into custody without incident,” Los Angeles police said on Twitter.
Earlier Saturday (July 21), an armed man barricaded himself inside a Trader Joe’s grocery store in Los Angeles on Saturday afternoon, prompting a massive police response with people still inside the store.
Here are the latest developments:
— The suspect, who is in his late teens, shot his grandmother and a younger female earlier in the day, police said.
— He ran into the Trader Joe’s after crashing his grandmother’s car outside the store during a police pursuit, police said.
— An unknown number of people are still inside the store in the Silver Lake neighborhood, though some walked out apparently unharmed, police said.
— Police are communicating with the suspect “trying to bring this to a peaceful conclusion,” Sgt. Barry Montgomery of the LAPD said.
— Eighteen ambulances and more than 100 firefighters are at the scene of the incident, Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman David Ortiz said.
Events began with a shooting in the 1600 block of 32nd Street around 1:30 p.m. (4:30 p.m. ET) in which an elderly woman and a young woman were victims, LAPD Officer Mike Lopez told CNN.
The suspect, described by police and witnesses as an African-American male, fled in a 2015 Toyota Camry, taking the younger victim with him. He fired multiple rounds at officers during the police pursuit, Lopez said. None of the officers was injured.
The chase ended when the suspect crashed the vehicle, got out and ran into the store on Hyperion Avenue in the Silver Lake neighborhood, Lopez said.
Customers immediately ran out of the store and police surrounded the building. Over the course of the standoff, several people walked out of the store with their hands up. Some employees climbed out a back window on a chain ladder.
Los Angeles Fire Department spokeswoman Margaret Stewart said a 20-year-old woman was transferred to a hospital in fair condition. She was removed from a vehicle, not the inside of the store, Stewart said. It was not immediately known whether that woman was the one from the original shooting.
Witness Devin Field said it appeared traffic prevented the suspect from escaping police when he crashed in front of the store.
The suspect had a pistol in his hand and “just started opening fire on the police behind him,” Field said. When police returned fire, Field and others got down on the ground, he said.
“After he was inside the store for a little while they had me crawl away from the scene and run away around the corner,” Field said.
“He was very focused in getting out of the cops’ vision,” witness Miguel Trujillo said. “The exchange of bullets were all in an instant.”
A manager at Gelson’s Market, across the street from Trader Joe’s, said people inside the market heard shots fired outside. Many people yelled and dropped to the floor, she said. The manager did not wish to give her name.
No one inside Gelson’s was hurt to her knowledge. The store is currently on lockdown, but customers are allowed exit through the back of the building.
CNN spoke to employees at nearby Jersey Mikes and What the Fish, both stores are on lockdown and no one was injured.
Public safety agencies responded in force, with an armored police vehicle parked outside the store and seven ambulances and dozens of law enforcement vehicles arriving on the scene.
Aerial video shot from a helicopter showed armed officers carrying shields and a man walking out with his hands up. It also showed officers carrying a person who appeared to be injured.
