By KEVIN MORAN
Houston Chronicle
HOUSTON, Tex. — A Houston motel guest was taken hostage this morning by a man who was being chased by police along the feeder road of the North Freeway around 4:30 a.m., officials said.
The hostage situation ended after brief telephone negotiations and the woman was uninjured. But one officer was grazed in the arm by a bullet during the chase, said HPD spokesman Sgt. Nate McDuell.
An HPD SWAT team was called out to the Studio Plus motel after patrol cars chased two men in a vehicle from a nearby restaurant to the hotel, McDuell said. The men may have been trying to rob the restaurant, he said.
The men abandoned the vehicle at the motel and officers took one into custody immediately, McDuell said.
The second man managed to get to the motel’s third floor, found a woman in the hallway and forced her back into her room. The man did not harm her physically, McDuell said.
“She is okay but a little shaken up,” McDuell said of the hostage.
Police recovered one 9-millimeter pistol from the first man arrested, McDuell said. He declined to say whether other weapons were found.
Copyright 2007 Houston Chronicle