A school bus driver was fatally shot in Midland County, Ala., by a man who boarded the bus with children on board and then abducted a six-year-old student. He is holding the child hostage in an underground bunker. WSFA's Samuel King reports.
By Erin McClam and Matthew DeLuca, NBC News
An Alabama man was holding a child hostage in an underground bunker early Wednesday after he boarded a school bus, shot and killed the driver, and took the boy, authorities and witnesses said.
Witnesses told WSFA, a local NBC station, that the man was talking to authorities through a PVC pipe. The station reported that the child, age 5 or 6, was not hurt but that authorities were calling the situation delicate.
The Dale County school system said 21 students made it off the bus safely. The abduction took place after school Tuesday in Midland City, a town of about 2,300 near the Alabama-Florida state line.
The Dothan Eagle newspaper quoted a neighbor, Michael Creel, as saying that the shooter was 67 years old. Creel described the bunker as a ?homemade bomb shelter,? roughly 4 feet wide, 6 feet long and 8 feet deep and covered by several feet of sand.
A second neighbor, James Edward Davis Jr., told the newspaper that the man would be ?outside in his yard digging dirt at 2:30 in the morning.? Another neighbor, Danny Dean, told NBC News that the man had dug up his own driveway.
?He?s always got a shovel,? Dean said. ?You would be amazed at the dirt he?s moved with a shovel by hand.?
A minister said that the man boarded the bus and told most of the students to get off. The man grabbed the boy, shot the bus driver several times and ran off with the boy, the minister said, quoting children he had talked to.
The bus driver, Charles Albert Poland Jr., 66, had worked as a driver for the county since 2009. Linda Williams, a county tax clerk whose cousin was married to Poland, described him to NBC News as ?a good Christian man? who was active in church.
WSFA reported that the driver had tried to stop the man before being shot. The boy reportedly fainted before he was taken.
The minister, Michael Senn, told WSFA that the other children ran for safety and hid behind Destiny Church.
?All the kids are at a safe place,? he said, though he added that they all appeared to be in shock.
Dean said that the man had lived in the neighborhood a year and a half to two years. He said the man had been friendly to him but was not known in the neighborhood to socialize or go to church.
Claudia Davis, who lives on the road where the standoff was taking place, told The Associated Press: ?Before this happened, I would see him at several places, and he would just stare a hole through me.?
Creel told the newspaper that the man was ?the type that thinks the government?s out to get them.?
In addition to the county sheriff?s department, local police, the FBI and a SWAT team were on the scene. Authorities ordered people living nearby to leave during the standoff.
The office of Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley said the governor was closely watching the situation.
?Prayers for law enforcement, this child?s family and the community are lifted up,? the governor?s press secretary, Jennifer Ardis, said on Twitter.
Rep. Martha Roby, who represents the area, also asked for prayers and added on Twitter: ?Let?s be patient as law enforcement officers do their best to get to the bottom of this and bring the person responsible to justice.?
Schools in Dale County and the nearby city of Ozark were closed for the rest of the week. Dale County schools said counselors would be available to help students, including those who were on the bus.
The Dothan Eagle via AP
A man boarded this stopped school bus in the town of Midland City on Tuesday afternoon and shot the driver when he refused to let a child off the bus. The bus driver died.
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