El Paso Police arrest a migrant in front of Sacred Heart Church on Wednesday, Jan. 4, 2023.
San Diego, California – A domestic violence report in San Diego’s Mid-City neighborhood Monday morning spiraled into a police standoff that forced two nearby schools to shut down for the day.
Police say the incident began just after 6:20 a.m. when a family member called authorities to report that a 24-year-old man had threatened his mother with a gun at the Villa Madrid Apartments on 54th Street near Trojan Avenue. By the time officers arrived, the man had climbed onto the roof of the complex, weapon in hand.
That set off a massive police response, with SWAT officers deployed to contain the situation. San Diego Police Lt. Jonathan Dungan said the safety of both the victim and the neighborhood was the priority. “Domestic violence situations are always high-intense situations,” he told reporters. “We try to handle them with the utmost importance and take care of the victims and take the suspect in safely.”
The apartment complex sits directly across the street from Horace Mann Middle School, and only a short distance from Crawford High. As police established a perimeter, both schools were placed on lockdown. District officials later announced that classes were canceled for the day, citing safety concerns and the ongoing shelter-in-place order in the surrounding neighborhood.
Parents who arrived that morning described a tense scene. Tasha Williamson, who dropped her child off at school, recalled SWAT officers posted on rooftops with rifles trained on the apartment complex. “They still had SWAT teams on the roofs that had their guns aimed, ready to shoot,” she said. Another bystander, who identified himself as a relative of the suspect, told parents that the man was eventually taken into custody.
The standoff lasted roughly three hours. Around 9:55 a.m., police announced the man had been arrested without further incident. Officers also recovered the firearm. He now faces charges of felony domestic violence and weapons violations.
While the immediate danger has passed, the episode underscored how quickly domestic disputes can spill over into the public square. In this case, what began as a call about threats inside a family home forced dozens of officers into action, disrupted an entire neighborhood, and left hundreds of students and parents scrambling.
San Diego police emphasized that no injuries were reported and credited the quick coordination between law enforcement, school officials, and family members for bringing the incident to a peaceful close. Still, for families in the El Cerrito area, Monday morning was anything but routine — a reminder of how fragile safety can feel when violence erupts close to home.
