By Joanna Putman
Police1
LEE COUNTY, Fla. — The Lee County Sheriff’s Office has released new footage from a deadly hostage situation that occurred inside a Bank of America in South Florida in February, WEAR reported.
The footage, released on June 8, aims to provide additional context to the incident, which ended with a SWAT sniper fatally shooting the suspect, according to the report.
The incident involved a bank robbery where the suspect, Sterling Ramon Alavache, 36, took two hostages on Feb. 6. Alavache was armed with a knife and claimed to have a bomb, according to the sheriff’s office.
Hostage negotiations commenced, and SWAT was deployed to the scene. Marceno stated that the situation escalated when the suspect became physically aggressive.
“He started to put one of the hostages in a headlock and had the knife to her throat,” Sheriff Carmine Marceno said.
Security footage from inside the bank reflects that description, showing the suspect moving a man and a woman to the corner of the room and threatening them.
At that critical moment, a SWAT sniper intervened, shooting and killing Alavache. Video taken from behind the SWAT team’s formation shows officers lining up, with one officer setting up a rifle in the team member supported firing position, according to the incident briefing.
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After observing the suspect threatening the lives of the hostages, the officer took one shot through a computer monitor, killing the suspect, police video and security footage show.
Neither of the hostages was injured during the incident.
“I couldn’t be more proud of the men and women of law enforcement today, my family members today, the SWAT team today,” Marceno said at the time. “How you train is how you perform, and this is exactly what we train for.”