Deputies Shoot Man in Hiram Standoff

Updated 3 p.m.

Marietta police say their investigation has found that McCrary spent time in Douglas, Henry, Paulding and Cherokee counties, as well as Cobb, while eluding capture for 10 days.

Updated 1 p.m. Friday

McCrary remains at Atlanta Medical Center in critical condition.

Charges in Paulding County are pending, and he faces robbery, aggravated assault and other charges in Marietta, Gurley said.

McCrary is suspected of being the who robbed a BB&T branch in northeast Marietta on Halloween.

He and his alleged accomplice, Megan Haney, were spotted Tuesday in Marietta, prompting but not McCrary.

A man believed to be McCrary ate at a Waffle House in Marietta on Thursday, then pulled a gun and left without paying, prompting another unsuccessful neighborhood manhunt by , WSB-TV reported.

The standoff that night began when deputies responded to a report of a stolen vehicle at the home on Bollen Lane. The Chevrolet Suburban had been reported stolen from on Veterans Memorial Highway in Austell.

Updated 11 a.m. Friday

The man deputies shot has been identified as John Edward McCrary, 33. The residence was 33 Bollen Lane, Hiram. "At some point in the conversation, McCrary pulled a handgun and pointed it at his head and threatened to shoot himself,"  spokesman Sgt. Brandon Gurley said today in the update.

Original Report

A police standoff inside a Hiram-area house ended with a gunman shot late Thursday night.

Paulding County sheriff’s deputies opened fire on the man in a bedroom when he pointed a handgun at them after four hours of roller-coaster negotiations, spokesman Sgt. Brandon Gurley said early today.

The man was taken by helicopter to a hospital with wounds that appeared serious, Gurley said.

He did not identify the gunman but said he is wanted on robbery, aggravated assault and other charges in Cobb County.

Gurley said the drama began about 8 p.m. after a car dealership in Austell used GPS tracking to find a vehicle stolen from its lot.

The vehicle was outside a house near the intersection of Virgie Ballentine Drive and Boulder Run, just east of Bill Carruth Parkway and not far from , and the dealership called in the Sheriff’s Office.

When deputies went into the house to ask about the stolen vehicle, the man pulled out a small-caliber handgun and threatened to kill himself, Gurley said.

“We try to talk the person down from the state of mind that they’re in,” he said.

The man remained in a bedroom with law officers outside the door throughout the four-hour standoff.

The gunman was visiting a recent acquaintance at the house, and that person and one other were quickly evacuated, Gurley said.

The SWAT team and a negotiator joined the standoff, which involved about 20 deputies, Gurley said.

He said the man was on an emotional roller coaster, sometimes calm, other times agitated and angry. At one point the man put down the gun, but he didn’t give deputies room to grab it.

“The entire time he was threatening to kill himself or have us kill him,” Gurley said.

Shortly before midnight, the man pointed the gun at deputies, who opened fire before he could pull the trigger, Gurley said.

He said it appears that two deputies fired no more than three shots, all of which hit the man.

As it always does with shootings involving officers, the Sheriff’s Office is turning the investigation over to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.