A six-hour SWAT standoff in Fayette County ended Sunday with a man arrested on charges of child molestation, according to the sheriff’s office.
Deputies were called to a home in the Kenwood Landing Mobile Home Park off Milam Road, just outside Fairburn, shortly before 8 a.m., according to a sheriff’s office statement. When they arrived, they spoke with a woman outside the home who said she’d been in an argument with 27-year-old Christopher Anthony Smith about a female child.
The woman told deputies that Smith assaulted her with a knife during the confrontation, the statement read. As deputies spoke with the victim, Smith came out of the front door with a knife and began harming himself and threatening to take his own life, authorities said.
Smith then went back inside the house and barricaded himself, according to the sheriff’s office. The Fayette County SWAT team responded and established a perimeter around the home.
After six hours, “less lethal measures” were taken to get Smith out, the statement read. It was not clear what method was used.
Smith was arrested and taken to Piedmont Fayette Hospital for evaluation and was released into police custody later the same day. He faces charges of aggravated assault and child molestation. He is being held at the Fayette County jail.
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