Baby Held Hostage, Stabbed in Standoff Jun 26, 1:13 PM EDT ST. GEORGE, Utah (AP) -- A man who took a baby hostage stabbed the infant during a standoff with police before officers shot and wounded the man in the hip. The baby was flown to a Salt Lake City hospital Friday night with stab wounds to some internal organs, but was expected to live, St. George police spokesman Craig Harding said Saturday. Police identified the suspect as Valentin S. Echevarria, and said the child was believed to be his girlfriend's. Officials were not sure if the child was his. The child's mother ran to a neighbor and called police Friday night, saying she had been stabbed in the hand by a man who still had her baby in her home. Officers negotiated with the man - who was in the country illegally - in Spanish, but he did not drop the knife and continued to threaten the child. When officers saw Echevarria stab the baby, they tried to subdue him with the beanbag rounds, then bullets, Harding said. "It stopped him from doing what he was doing and we were able to grab the child and rush it to medical services," Harding said. An officer grabbed the child and ran it to a waiting ambulance. Harding believed the child is a boy around 6-7 months old, but wasn't certain about the gender. Echevarria, 28, had been deported recently, Harding said. He was treated and released for a gunshot wound to the hip, then taken to a jail and held on charges of aggravated attempted murder and aggravated kidnapping, Harding said. The Associated Press. http://www.dailyrecord.com/
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