Armed siege at Hoyts cinema as police shut down shopping centre
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November 5, 2012 - 11:23AM (in Au)
looks like a restrictive gun laws fail again
News still fresh on this apparently...
Police received the first call at 6.09am from the guards who had disturbed two armed people inside the cinema, the Illawarra Mercury reported.
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They told police they had seen a gun, believed to be a rifle.
Subway owner David Vasquez told the Mercury he was inside just after 6am, when police came into the food court.
"Police ladies came in screaming out 'Is anyone in here?'. I said 'Yep'. They said: 'You have got to evacauate the building straight away'. I asked why and they said to me 'there is a gunman in the centre and we need to be evacuated'."
Witnesses reported seeing teams of heavily armed police entering the shopping centre after 6am.
EWS (2/2): with the police now in control of the situation, Hoyts Warrawong will remain closed until further notice
— HoytsAustralia (@HoytsAustralia) November 4, 2012
PolAir, dog squad, state protection support unit, rescue squad, detectives and general duties officers are at the scene.
According to the cinema's website, the movie sessions were not due to begin at 10am.
Roads surrounding the shopping centre are blocked until further notice.
A witness at the shopping centre, Simon Davie, said traffic was blocked six kilometres away.
"We've all had to come out and all the shops have been evacuated.
"They've just put a perimeter around it all and they're ... diverting all the traffic.