On Dec. 23, 2008, former child star Mark Everett engaged El Monte, Calif. cops in a standoff with his young son, Benjamin, in tow.
Everett reportedly held his son hostage, holding a gun to the boy's head, which prompted officers to detonate a flash-bang grenade. While Everett was killed in a subsequent shootout, Benjamin was rescued.
The FBI tells AMW that the first call came in around 3 p.m. A short time later, cops arrived at a shopping center at 3580 Santa Anita Ave. to conduct a welfare check. Both police and witnesses say they saw a man holding a gun and dragging a boy into a Mexican eatery then a Chinese restaurant. Investigators say that Everett was barely recognizable -- looking thin and gaunt, with salt and pepper hair.
The FBI reports that, Everett, dressed in a bomber jacket and armed with a revolver and another handgun, barricaded himself in the restaurant bathroom with his son, 7-year-old Benjamin. Investigators say that Everett seemed to be lucid at times but also made threats that he may harm Benjamin.
The hostage standoff lasted two hours before police tossed in a flash-bang grenade in an attempt to rescue Benjamin and arrest Everett. When a crisis team attempted to enter the bathroom, shots were exchanged, injuring young Benjamin and killing Everett.
The Everetts' prior locations have not been ascertained just yet, authorities say.
Meanwhile, the FBI says that Everett's mother, Elizabeth Velasco, has not been located. Velasco disappeared with her son after the 2004 murder of Stephanie Spears, Benjamin's mother.