And the story goes like this.

Some things in this world you just can't grasp Strange shit happens out of no where that really makes you think. I can get all philosophical, or I can tell things the way that I saw them. I am sick of retelling this story, so I'll type it out

The key to painting a vivid picture is to accurately describe the setting.
It was Valentines Day night, February 14th, 2009. I was never a fan of Valentine's Day, but a series of events led to a hyped up Valentine's Day this year. Gabby, one of my roommates, told us that her boyfriend was coming up to visit from Texas. He isn't home much, he's in the army, and the last time he was up in Greensburg, Gabby had her friends over and they all played beer pong and made a get together out of it. We all like Matt here, so we figured it's time to get everyone together. So henceforth, the big Valentine's Day party.

It wasn't even supposed to be a party, just a get together with our friends.

So then we get to my side of the story. I love my friends, and I love the fact that I have only a handful up in Greensburg. This handful is fucking great. We are tight as shit, yo. So I figured if Gabby and company will be having fun, I'll have Marie, Nick, and Ashlan over. After all, we've been drinking here for the last 3 weekends, the last 6 weekend nights, etc. So let's keep the train rolling.
Anyways, Gabby's friends left around 1 am. Following this was the nightly acoustic guitar session in the living room between me and Nick. Gabby and Matt hung out with the four of us and Matt was all about it singing and playing a snare drum I brought downstairs. They disappeared off to bed a little while later. Of course, when you're drunk, time flies. Somehow, it got to around 3 am. Marie and I were talking about life and realized Nick and Ashlan were passed out. That happens a lot. They wake up pretty easy though.

We migrated upstairs to my bedroom, since my room is always warm. Nick and Ashlan always bring their sleeping bags, and they were in Ashlan's car. Nick decided to go down to the car and get the sleeping bags. Keep in mind, we were all still pretty drunk at this time.

Nick was walking to the car, which was parked down Ohara from our house, where we always park, when he heard a cop yelling a bunch of stuff towards him. "Get down! Get out of here! Get away!" All that kind of stuff. Nick didn't want to look suspicious so he just walked back up to the car. He came into the house and told us that there was a cop outside, so we moved to the room next to my bedroom. Perfect centered view of the street below, all the way down to 130.

Our house is on a hill overlooking Ohara Street, on the corner of Ohara and Harrson. If you drive up the hill on Ohara, you would hit our house if you do not drive around our house at the intersection. Therefore, our top floor windows overlooked the whole situation, which took place down towards the bottom of the hill near 130. The house was near the corner of Concord and Ohara, which was 1 street down from Harrison. We didn't see the house, but we saw the cop cars and the majority of the action.

At this point, cars started pouring off of 130 onto Ohara, and we knew something was up. Police lights and police everywhere. There was a police car parked halfway up the street with a couple of officers taking cover with guns over the side of the car the whole night. The whole time, we had our theories about what was going on, but come on, we had no idea.

I would say at this point it was going on 4:00 AM , we knew something was up, and it was still very dark out. We set up shop in the little room and started to listen in on the action. We opened the windows and screens and froze our asses off while Ashlan and Marie were passed out in my room. We heard slight chatter from the various cops and tried to listen in to the radio. We heard things about a 2nd floor.

At this point, like I said, I was out of it, so I remember details here and there. No specific order.

There were guys coming in and out with a pretty large amount of body armor on. There were shields and rifles.
Some of these guys ran from yard to yard, inching back towards the main house, and then making their way back to safety.
The silhouettes were creepy in the slight light that we could see.

At first, we would hear gunshots here and there, and we would hear breaking glass. Nick and I kept looking at each other. Were those really gun shots?

The police evacuated a house across the street from the ground zero house and had the family leave for the extent of the incident. What really amazed me is the cops ran up to the back porch, and unscrewed a flood light that was on to give themselves some added stealth. This seems like this was pretty much their base and cover.

Police vehicles would come and go, and more personnel would arrive. Pedestrians would drive by and be turned around. We remained unnoticed, perched up in my top floor.

At some point while it was still dark out, a police officer acquired a megaphone and this is when things really started to heat up.

A common phrase was, "Joe, come to the window."
"Joe, you gotta stop firing rounds and breaking windows if we are going to cooperate."
"Joe, you gotta speak up. Come to the window."

We could hear the officer loud and clear, but not Joe. Just the fact that he was yelling.

There was a period of time where they kept asking him for his cell phone number, and his dad's cell phone number. I guess his dad wasn't answering his cell phone, and they asked for the house phone number. I'm not really sure if they ever did get ahold of his dad, which is sad. The phone period went on for a while. They kept telling him to relax, and that they were going to get him a phone.

As it got lighter, more police officers were evident in different areas around the neighboring houses. The big bags that we saw some of the men carrying turned out to be dogs. There were more and more guys in armor, and more and more guys with large guns. Spots of darkness dissolved into three or four bodies at a time.

Also, as it got lighter, I decided to grab my camera and my zoom lens. I hung out of the window and tried to get as many photos as I could. I tried developing them tonight and a lot of the ones that did come out looked pretty dark, so we'll see how that goes. I think I ruined the roll of film.

Around this time, people started walking around, realizing something was going on. A man strolled by walking his dog, and he stopped to talk to the cop who was still in a car below our house.

"What's going on? Car wreck down there or something?"
The cop rolled down his window, "What?"
"Car wreck?"

Out of no where, there were 2 consecutive shots. The first almost sounded like a smaller gun, like the earlier shots, and the second shot that immediately followed had the distinct crack of a shotgun. The guy walking the dog took off running down Harrison. He stopped and came back towards the cop car. Yeah, car wreck, right. Nick and I had a feeling something went down at this point, and there was silence for a while.

"Joe, come to the window."
"Come to the window, Joe."

There was nothing. It got lighter, and an ambulance showed up in no hurry. We figured Joe killed himself, but apparently this late in the incident, he took his FIRST shot at a police officer. Another police officer fired in defense, and ended the conflict. It was obvious that this whole thing was going to end with a sad resolution.

Seton Hill went on lockdown and lots of phone calls were made. We weren't allowed to leave the house for a little while. Nick, Ashlan, and Marie eventually made their way back to Seton Hill and I went to bed. By now, it was going on 9:30 AM. I had to work at 2 PM. The action was over, but the whole incident won't be for a while. School will be awkward and I didn't even know the kid. Rest in peace.