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Hostage: I thought I'd be dead
Early Edition: Chris Perez describes being held captive for 10 hours with a friend and four others at a Tampa gun range. "If I would have had a gun, I would have shot him myself."
Published April 13, 2007
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[Times photo: Daniel Wallace] William "Chris" Perez, 24, talks about being held hostage for 10 hours.
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AMPA - A man who took hostages at a north Tampa gun range demanded Xanax and then swallowed dozens of pills before shooting himself in the head Friday just feet from captives, a witness said.
"If I would have had a gun, I would have shot him myself," said gun range customer Chris Perez, 24, who was looking for a cashier at Shooting Sports Inc. Thursday afternoon when the man put a gun to his head.
Perez, held captive for about 10 hours, recounted the episode for reporters today.
He said a man deputies identified as Jeffrey Lane Dudney, 43, got rattled when a gun range employ hit a panic button after noticing Dudney was trying to steal a gun. That triggered a lock of the front doors and a call to 911.
Dudney wanted to kill himself, Perez said.
Dudney, trapped inside, took hostages, including range owner Margaret C. Flesche, 64, Mark G. Little, 57, John Murray, 33, Perez and his friend Timothy J. Bechard.
Perez said Dudney let Flesche sit in a chair but made the men lie on the floor for two hours, before finally letting them sit up. They had to urinate in jugs in the office.
At one point, Dudney asked Perez and Bechard how good their friendship was. He told them that if one tried to flee, the other would be shot, Perez said.
"I thought a couple times I was going to be dead," Perez said.
Dudney first told police he wanted a car, then changed his mind and said he wanted Xanax, Perez said. Dudney told hostages he'd been trying to get Xanax and couldn't get any. He said he was addicted to it and had to have some.
He asked for 40 to 50 pills. Hostage negotiators gave him about five, Perez said. Later, they sent in the full number requested, and Dudney dumped them into his hand 10 at a time, gulping them down.
Before he killed himself, he seemed in a daze, Perez said.
[Last modified April 13, 2007, 15:27:55]
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by Madeline
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04/13/07 03:42 PM
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This what happens when you let murderers out on bail. They don't have anything to lose.
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