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Rooftop standoff ends in arrest
Luis Vazquez, an armed robbery suspect, iscaptured in Tarpon.
By ROBIN STEIN
Published June 27, 2006
TARPON SPRINGS - A fugitive charged with armed robbery in Massachusetts was arrested by Tarpon Springs police after a standoff early Monday morning, authorities said. In response to a tip from local residents, police went about 12:30 a.m. to a home at 24 Ada St., in search of Luis F. Vazquez, 34, said spokesmen Sgt. J. Allen MacKenzie. Vazquez, 34, had been hiding out in Tarpon Springs, police said, working for Able Body Labor for about a month. He had been on the run from a Massachusetts warrant charging him with robbing a grocery store in a Boston suburb in April. A security camera at the Market Basket Grocery in Methuen, Mass., showed two men entering the busy store on April 21, according to a television news report. The video shows one of the men approaching a clerk with a handgun and demanding cash from the register, while the other man stood guard. The duo was in and out in less that two minutes, the report said. When Tarpon Springs police found Vazquez alone in the Ada Street house Monday morning, they said he was unarmed, but scrambling to avoid being arrested. "Vazquez positioned himself on the roof of the location and refused to surrender," he said. It took at least 20 minutes and six officers to arrest Vazquez, said MacKenzie. Vazquez was held without bail Monday night in the Pinellas County Jail, pending extradition to Massachusetts. Officials from the Methuen Police Department did not return phone calls Monday afternoon. The status of the second suspect was unknown.
[Last modified June 26, 2006, 23:29:40]
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