JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A SWAT incident in Mandarin has ended peacefully after nearly 12 hours, The Jacksonville Sheriff's Office reported.
JSO and its SWAT team were called to the Waterford Estates neighborhood Sunday where deputies said a mentally ill person was threatening to kill himself.
The standoff forced more than a dozen people who lived nearby out of their homes for several hours.
Taraneh Janati is one of dozens of neighbors who police wouldn’t allow to return home after officers blocked off streets for hours in the neighborhood.
"It was cars and cars and cars, and they just had to be turned away. I’ve never seen anything like that," Janati said.
Janati spent more than four hours out of her home as she returned to her neighborhood surrounded by police cars.
"When I first got here at 4:30 there was, like, 15 people parked this way with their families trying to get to their homes couldn’t get to their houses," Janati said.
Neighbors tell us police cars started to gather on their street near London Lakes Drive around 2:30 p.m. and by evening SWAT was bringing in all of their heavy gear, along with the command center.
"I came by here at 2:30 and there was, like, seven police cars out front," said neighbor Shirley Walker. "I wondered what was going on then I came back about 30 minutes ago and police was here and I couldn’t go down there."
Walker said police told her to call the nonemergency line to find out more information.
"They said to call the nonemergency number and maybe we could find out," she said. "I don’t imagine they’ll tell you anything."
People have been posting that they’re praying for the person’s safety and hoping for a positive outcome. "Something like this happens and you kind of hope for their safety," Janati said. "It’s pretty intense."
The man inside the home eventually surrendered Monday morning around 1 a.m. Police said no one was hurt, but he was taken to the hospital. His identity has not yet been released.