LOCAL : Huntington Beach Siege Ends

After a five-hour police siege this morning, a 41-year-old man surrendered to Huntington Beach police following a tear-gas assault on the blood-spattered apartment in which he had locked himself.

Police evacuated about 30 residents of the 198-unit Villa Yorba Apartments, Villa Yorba Drive at San Angelo Drive, after finding messages written in blood in a hallway. Police said they initially feared that a woman had been killed and that the suspect was still inside.

Later, however, police learned that the man was alone. He emerged after police lobbed tear-gas into the third-floor apartment about 9:45 a.m. No weapons were found.

The suspect, identified as Rudolph Sandoval of Huntington Beach, had cut himself with broken glass and written the blood messages on the wall because he was despondent over a breakup with his girlfriend, police said. He was taken for hospital treatment of cuts on his hands, arms and feet and for a 72-hour psychiatric examination, officers said. He may later be booked on suspicion of interfering with police and resisting arrest, police said.

Police said Sandoval had locked himself up in his girlfriend’s apartment after she had left during a quarrel. The woman, identified as Sharon Christensen, 32, was not harmed.