SWAT situation ends at Jeannette mobile home park; officials ask public to disregard safety alert
JEANNETTE, Pa. (KDKA) — State police converged on a mobile home park in Westmoreland County on Monday.
There was a nine-hour standoff in the area of Penn Adamsburg Road and Wencliff Lane at the Hilltop Estates in Jeannette that ended around 9 p.m., police and fire officials said. Police and negotiators were talking with a barricaded person in a trailer park, and the coroner said the individual, Gerald A. Long Jr., died by suicide from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Earlier, officials told residents to disregard a "shelter in place" alert that was sent out earlier.
"Avoid the area and find an alternate route around if you need to go that way but there is no need for city residents to shelter in place and no threat to the city," the fire department said on Facebook.
The alert was "inadvertently sent to the whole region without specific information," according to the fire department.
"I was very nervous and concerned," said Beth Iapalucci, who received the alert despite living 20 miles from where the standoff was.
Westmoreland County Public Safety sent out the alert. Officials said it was sent through the OnSolve CodeRED platform and was supposed to go to people located within a little more than a 2-mile radius around the intersection of Penn Adamsburg Road and Den Rick Lane.
At this time, they don't know what caused the issue. Public Safety opened a tech case with CodeRED support to figure out what happened and how to fix it in the future.
"It put me through unnecessary stress and others through unnecessary stress," Iapalucci said. "But when it works right, it's a great system, it really is."