Hostages Kill Captor: Escaped Convict Picks The Wrong House
Hostages kill captor — not the way a standoff typically ends, but that’s what reports out of Iowa have stated.
USA Today reported that escaped inmate Rodney Eugene Long, 38, had broken out of the Clarinda Correctional Facility and had been on the run since Friday evening. On Monday, he took an elderly couple hostage at approximately 10:15 pm CST.
Jerome Mauderly, a 71-year-old retired prison guard, and his wife Carolyn, 66, were sleeping in the bedroom of their small, one-story home at the time.
Long held the couple hostage for around four hours with a semi-automatic handgun in his possession. During that time, he disabled their landline phone and called an unspecified person on the couple’s cell phone. However, he didn’t account for the Mauderlys owning a shotgun.
“As the situation wore on, a decision was made by the Mauderlys that they were going to defend themselves,” said Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation special agent-in-charge Mitch Mortvedt.
According to authorities, Jerome fired on Long while the escaped convict was in the couple’s kitchen. Carolyn called 911 at approximately 2:10 am on Tuesday. Police found Long lying face down on the floor with a single gunshot wound.
Long allegedly shot a Taylor County deputy (approximately 20 miles from the prison) on Sunday night. The deputy, 33-year-old Dan Wyckoff, is in stable condition in an Omaha, Nebraska, hospital.
The Mauderlys gave no immediate comment on Monday, but neighbor Rosalyn Cummings, 62, told USA Today that Jerome Mauderly was “a very nice man, very quiet and calm.”
“He’s a great guy, and I feel sorry for him because I think it would be very difficult,” Cummings said.
While “hostages kill captor” stories are a bit of a rarity, homeowners firing on home intruders happens a bit more than you would think.
In June, this California grandmother took a (less deadly) shot at one home intruder, while defending her 85-year-old wheelchair-bound husband (also a World War II veteran).
Also in June, a 9-year-old used a robber’s own gun to ward off a home invasion.
With stories like the one below, it’s understandable why homeowners might have a shoot-first, ask-questions-later mentality:
Do you think the Iowa hostages, who killed their captor, were justified?
[Image via ShutterStock]
