He had a sledgehammer and a machete and it took 15 Whatcom deputies to arrest him
A 37-year-old man with warrants out of New York barricaded himself with a sledgehammer and a machete in a downstairs bathroom/laundry room of a home near Lynden for approximately four hours Thursday night and early Friday before the Whatcom County Sheriff’s deputies were able to take him into custody.
Pablo Ernesto Melendez was booked into Whatcom County Jail on suspicion of fourth-degree assault, harassment, second-degree malicious mischief, second-degree theft, first-degree criminal impersonation, obstructing a police officer and resisting arrest and is being held in lieu of $25,000 bail.
Chief Deputy Kevin Hester told The Bellingham Herald in an email Monday that Melendez, who is from the Bronx, N.Y., but has been living in Whatcom County for approximately two months, also has an extraditable warrant out of New York for parole violation on second-degree assault and a hate crime charge.
According to information provided by Hester, Melendez used a clothes dryer to barricade himself in the bathroom/laundry room in a home just south of Wiser Lake, and it took 15 deputies, including negotiators, approximately four hours to enter the room and get him out.
Melendez refused to exit after he was told he was being placed under arrest, Hester said, forcing deputies to eventually break a laundry room window to deploy a camera and prepare for the possibility of using a chemical irritant gas. No gas was needed, though, as deputies eventually were able to push the door open enough to enter the room and take Melendez into custody.
The incident began at about 11 p.m. Dec. 5, Hester said, when Melendez’s roommates complained that he was playing his music too loud. Melendez became angry and kicked open his female roommate’s bedroom door and demanded to know what she was going to do to him.
The woman reportedly escorted Melendez out of her room, but he kicked the door open a second time, before his male roommate, who is the homeowner, restrained Melendez.
Between 5:30 a.m. and 6 a.m. Thursday, Melendez locked himself in the downstairs bathroom/laundry room along with a sledgehammer and machete, Hester said, using the sledgehammer to damage the room and the clothes washer. The homeowner turned off the water and power to the bathroom, reportedly prompting Melendez to yell he was going to kill the homeowner and threaten to use the machete.
While he was in the room, Melendez damaged two doors, the washer, a laptop computer and stereo speakers and pulled the dryer from the wall, breaking the electrical connection, Hester said. Melendez also used the sledgehammer to break through the floor and expose the crawl space under the home, break tiles, damage portions of the subflooring and ran water on the floor.
Hester said deputies were called at approximately 9 p.m., and they called for the negotiators at 11 p.m.
Deputies later learned that Melendez had identified himself as Gabriel Ramirez in the two months he lived at the house and received mail under that name at the address.
