Man Holds Family Hostage; Kills Wife, Shoots Self

An man with a history of child abuse who held his wife and eight children hostage Thursday shot his spouse to death, then turned the gun on himself after a 6 1/2-hour standoff with police, authorities said.

The gunman, Dang Cha Xiong, 35, a refugee from Laos, was in critical condition.

The identity of the wife was not immediately available.

The children were safe, said Deputy Police Chief Lucian Neely. He said the gunman apparently had played Russian roulette with his hostages.

Dang, who reportedly was released from jail Thursday morning on an unspecified charge, had been involved in a long-standing feud with his wife’s parents and was under court order to stay away from his family, Neely said.

The deputy chief said Dang had told officers during telephone negotiations that he would surrender. But police then heard four shots from inside the apartment.

Officers rushed the dwelling, finding the children unharmed in a front room and the couple in a rear bedroom. The wife was pronounced dead at Dameron Hospital in Stockton.

Police Lt. Andy Jackson said officers went to the apartment in the Tyrolean Village District, north of downtown, after a 12-year-old boy escaped from the dwelling at 2:05 p.m. and reported the incident.

“He escaped from the apartment and told us about it and that’s why we went over there,” Jackson said. The father “broke off negotiations about 5:25 p.m., but we got them started up again.”

The lieutenant did not say what precipitated the shootings and he did not immediately identify the weapon.

The boy told police that Dang had played Russian roulette with the hostages, apparently sticking a bullet in the chamber of his gun and clicking the trigger at random.

Jackson said Dang recently had been ordered by a local judge to stay away from his wife and children at the 1640 Tyrol Lane address.

Seven of the eight children were Dang’s, police said. The youngsters were reported to be between 1 and 13 years of age.

Last Jan. 30, five children were killed and 30 other people wounded on a Stockton school yard by a man who then shot himself to death.