Pepper spray, water fail to force man out A gunman who had kept authorities at bay for more than 30 hours at a downtown Billings motel abruptly surrendered late Tuesday.
After authorities spent most of Tuesday using tear gas, concussion grenades and a water cannon in attempts to force Robert Dorton from his room at the Town House Motel, Dorton came to his room's south window at 10:12 p.m. and gave up.
SWAT team members swarmed on Dorton when he hung his only arm out the window and he was taken into custody without incident. Other officers burst through the heavily barricaded front door and led Dorton out of the motel to a nearby office that had become the Police Department's command post since the incident began Monday afternoon.
Dorton was then put into a patrol cruiser, and Police Chief David Ward said Dorton, who had been raising rats in his room, will be taken to the psychiatric unit at Deaconess Medical Center for observation. He appeared to be unharmed.
"Nobody was hurt, and we can get him the help he needs," Ward said. "You can't ask for anything more than that."
Authorities tried to force Dorton out with tear gas, concussion bombs and thousands of gallons of water, and Ward said police were about to shut down their efforts when Dorton finally appeared ready to speak with negotiators.
Dorton, who had refused to negotiate with officers throughout the ordeal, could be seen at about 10 p.m. stepping near the south window. Police officer T.J. Vladic, speaking with a bullhorn, urged Dorton to put down his gun, remove the debris from in front of his door and walk out.
"We don't want to hurt you, and we don't want to be hurt either," Vladic said.
SWAT members near the window said later that Dorton was mumbling as he continued to come closer to the window, but they could not understand what he was saying.
Dorton appeared to try to hand something out of the window, then slowly leaned out the opening. As his hand came out, he was grabbed by the SWAT team waiting below.
As officers were leading him away from the motel, Dorton appeared to speak briefly with family members who had tried to persuade him to surrender.
Ward said he was uncertain what charges would be filed against Dorton and said the case would be turned over Wednesday to the Yellowstone County attorney's office. The chief said Dorton may be held at the hospital for the next few days.
Because of the residue of tear gas in the motel room, officers said they wouldn't try to search it thoroughly until Wednesday morning. Animal control officers late Tuesday did find six live rats and one dead rat and assumed others were still in the debris in the room.
The standoff began at 2 p.m. Monday when animal control officers attempted to serve a warrant at the Town House, 3420 First Ave. N. The warrant alleges that Dorton is raising at least 20 rats in his room in violation of a city ordinance. Dorton threatened an animal control officer, and he fired more than 30 shots from the apartment as officers tried to talk with him Monday. No one was injured and officers didn't return fire.
Police negotiators continued to try to talk with Dorton through the night, until he fired another shot at about 12:35 a.m. Tuesday. Negotiators backed off and the motel was quiet until SWAT team members moved on the back window of Dorton's room at about 7:45 a.m. Tuesday.
Wearing gas masks, the three members of the Billings police SWAT team fired one OC-10 pepper-spray grenade into the window. Shortly after it exploded inside the room, the officers tried to throw concussion grenades into the apartment.
But behind the window glass was a sheet of canvas that blocked two of the grenades, knocking them back into the alley. Both exploded in the alley and were answered by gunfire from inside the apartment. Two shots from the apartment were fired toward Montana Avenue, which was closed by police at the time. There were at least three more gunshots, at least one of which was fired at the officers retreating down the alley.
About 20 minutes later, officers tried to throw more grenades into Dorton's window on the east side of the Town House. It appeared that two of the grenades made it inside and one exploded outside the building.
Shortly thereafter, a Billings police negotiator, Sgt. Jay Berry, repeated a phrase through a bullhorn that he and other negotiators would use throughout the day.
"Robert, nobody wants to hurt you," Berry said. "We just want to get you and your buddies out of there."
Dorton's "buddies" are the rats that he raises.
Dorton didn't respond to Berry or to other negotiators. At about 9:30 a.m. Tuesday, a city dump truck full of sand was parked on the north sidewalk of Montana Avenue across from Dorton's room. The truck was put there to block any bullets that could have hit passing motorists on Montana Avenue and the street was reopened a short time later.
Negotiations were going nowhere when officers fired four more gas canisters into Dorton's windows at about 11 a.m. There was no response from inside the apartment. There was speculation that Dorton has a gas mask, but police could not confirm that Tuesday.
Next, a Billings Fire Department ladder truck with a high-pressure nozzle attached to the end of the ladder was brought in about noon. Water was blasted into Dorton's apartment through the south window.
Phil Frank, assistant Billings fire chief, said the water was fired into the apartment to clear the canvas out of the window and also to possibly force Dorton from the apartment. After two prolonged high-powered bursts of water, Berry once again tried to talk to Dorton, and again received no answer.
Over the next few hours, officers used several methods to see if Dorton was still conscious. A fiber optic cable with a camera on its end was run through one of the windows and officers also used periscopes to look into the apartment. At one point, police Lt. Tom Hanel stood on a stepladder and peered into the apartment as two other officers covered him with assault rifles.
Lt. Verne Petermann said the water cannon messed up Dorton's apartment and the debris was making it tough to see anything with the camera, which Pace Construction of Billings brought in to assist officers. The camera was linked to a television monitor that other officers watched in a makeshift command post just south of the Town House.
Gazette photo by Larry Mayer
The Billings SWAT team fills Robert Dorton's hotel room with water shortly before 8 p.m. Tuesday.
After not seeing or hearing anything for a couple of hours, the city SWAT team was preparing to enter the room with the Yellowstone County SWAT team covering it from the Town House parking lot.
That move was called off when officers noticed movement on a monitor for the camera, which had been placed inside the front door of the room. Officers said they saw what appeared to be an arm moving.
Berry tried to get Dorton using the bullhorn again. And for the first and last time during the standoff, Dorton answered officers. One of the members of the county SWAT team said he heard Dorton say that his buddies were all right in answer to one of Berry's questions. But after that single statement, Dorton again returned to silence.
At about 7:30 p.m., the dump truck moved down the alley and chains on the back of the truck were attached to the window frame on the south side of Dorton's room. The window was pulled out and two SWAT team members, covered by two other officers, brought up a fire hose and sprayed water into the room for nearly 10 minutes. Another officer with a hook attached to a long pole cleared debris from the window, trying to create a cleaner opening.
At 8 p.m. officers again poured water in through the south window, and shortly after that reporters on the scene were told to take cover and Red Cross volunteers were also cleared out.
Just after dark, at 8:30 p.m., the dump truck pulled up next to the south window again, this time with two large lights mounted in back to light up the window. In the back of the truck were two SWAT team members who'd dug a trench in the sand in the back of the truck. They crouched in the trench with their guns trained on the window. A thick metal shield placed over the side of the cab protected the driver.
A few minutes later, police tried to go into the room through the front door, but turned back after encountering barricades apparently thrown up by Dorton. Ten minutes later police attempted to throw two concussion bombs into the south window, but the bombs missed and blew up in the alley. The third one entered the window and exploded inside. Police also used tear gas on the apartment a few more times throughout the evening.
As the standoff continued, Rausch said the department's goal remained getting Dorton out of the room safely.
"Maybe a few years ago they would have bust in there," Rausch said. "We choose to do it more safely."
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