WOODBRIDGE, Va. — A man is dead after a lengthy standoff with police officers in Prince William County that started Wednesday night and stretched into Thursday morning.
According to police, officers were called to the 3400 block of Caledonia Circle in Woodbridge, near Prince William Academy, for a report of a suicidal person at 8:20 p.m. Wednesday night. The call came from his sister who was concerned he was suicidal.
Police found the 22-year-old man, identified as Gabriel Ramirez, a short time later at a friend's house in the 3000 block of Bromley Court. Police said when Ramirez was found, he was armed and acting erratically.
According to department spokesperson Lt. Jonathan Perok, officers were engaged in a standoff with Ramirez for several hours overnight, and attempted to get him to surrender safely. SWAT was called to assist.
After hours of failed negotiations, police got an emergency custody order to take Ramirez in early Thursday morning. When officers presented that order, investigators say Ramirez became even more erratic.
Police say at one point he came to the fence line in the backyard where he was located and pointed a gun at officers. This is when officers fired shots at Ramirez, killing him.
"With the townhouses in their backdrop presenting a danger not only to the officers but to others who may have been in those homes, unfortunately, officers fired and the young man lost his life," Chief Pete Newsham said in a press conference.
It's unclear how Ramirez obtained a gun but friends tell WUSA9 he had access to one.
"[A] friend was trying to calm him down and it went on all night long," resident Tara Jennings told WUSA9. "We just heard him saying, 'Leave me alone!' over and over again."
According to his best friend Zack Warner, Ramirez faced demons in the past but his mental health issues deteriorated within the last several weeks.
"He's been on the down side from the past month and I told him he's been needing to get help and it was hard for him to do that," Warner said. "It shows to everybody who is quiet out there, y'all seriously get some help."
Police also have a co-responder unit that pairs up mental health clinicians with officers. In this case, a mental health clinician wasn't on the scene.
Newsham said negotiators are already trained with crisis intervention and believed the scene was too risky for a mental health expert to approach Ramirez.
"It was too dangerous," Newsham said. "Our police officers here in Prince William County respond to folks in crisis almost on a daily basis. Sometimes multiple times during the course of the day. In the overwhelming majority in those instances, the officers and clinicians are able to safely bring them to services that they need and they deserve but unfortunately in this particular case, that's not the way it ended up."
No officers or members of the surrounding community were hurt, and there is no active threat to the community.
The regional Critical Incident Response Team (CIRT) will oversee the investigation as an independent body.
"He was so funny and the most trustworthy guy I've ever had in my entire life," Warner said of his best friend. "We lost a loved one today, a family member that will never be forgotten."