12-Hour Standoff on Freeway Ends in Suicide

A tense 12-hour standoff in the middle of Interstate 5 ended late Wednesday when a man wanted in connection with the June killing of his wife and stepson apparently shot himself.

SWAT team sharpshooters lay in a strip of dry grass alongside a rural section of Interstate 5 for hours before they heard gunshots and saw smoke come from the car. They had been negotiating with the man, who was wanted in the death of his relatives.

After hearing shots, police lobbed tear gas canisters at the vehicle and moved in to find Joaquin Gutierrez, 40, of Hollister, in the car with his head lying back. Gutierrez had been holding a gun to his chest and vowed not be taken alive. His car blocked the highway for most of the day.

By afternoon, members of the Stanislaus and Merced county sheriffs’ departments had spent hours waiting out the slaying suspect, said Sgt. Ted Eichman of the California Highway Patrol.

Gutierrez led police on a chase reaching speeds of 120 mph through Bay Area traffic Thursday morning until CHP officers stopped his car by throwing a strip of spikes on the road and flattening the tires.

Authorities surrounded Gutierrez, whose car came to a stop on the highway about three miles outside Newman, just after 7 a.m. About noon, officials got a phone to Gutierrez so they could negotiate more easily.

Gutierrez was named in a warrant from Hollister police in the June 23 killing of his wife, Guadalupe Gutierrez, 40, and a 15-year-old stepson. Guadalupe Gutierrez’s 21-year-old daughter was present during the shooting, police said. An 11-year-old son and an 8-year-old family friend left the house before the shooting.

Hollister police said Joaquin and Guadalupe Gutierrez were in the process of separating.

Joaquin Gutierrez, who worked in Fremont, fled after the shooting, but police believe he had been hiding in the Bay Area since.