FORT WAYNE – A man who refused to leave a Pettit Avenue home where he once lived surrendered late Monday morning after a standoff that lasted nearly three hours, Fort Wayne police said.
He has been identified as Michael M. Edmondson, 33, of Fort Wayne, and charged with residential entry.
The man first went to the house in the 500 block of East Pettit, between Lafayette and Warsaw streets, about 6 a.m., and a woman who lives there now told him he didn’t live there and had to leave, said Officer Raquel Foster, a city police spokeswoman, at the scene.
Edmondson returned to the house near Avondale Drive about 9 a.m., got inside and began arguing with the residents, Foster said. Two teenagers inside the home when Edmondson got in were able to flee to safety, Foster said later in a written statement.
The man did not have a cell phone with him and police were trying to find a way to contact him using one of the residents’ cell phones, Foster said.
When police pulled their armored vehicle to the front of the one-story house, and the Emergency Services Team moved in, she said, the man came out of the house with his hands high in the air about 11:50 a.m.
The current residents moved into the home recently, Foster said, and never met Edmondson before.
Pettit Avenue was closed between Lafayette and Warsaw streets for several hours because of the situation. It reopened before noon.
