The Barometer Online

Issue date: 4/1/09 Section: News

Media Credit: Peter Strong Corvallis Police take custody of Nathan M. Lenahan in the alleyway behind his residence on Tuesday afternoon. Lenahan threatened his neighbor with a knife earlier in the morning.

Media Credit: Jeff Wick S.W.A.T. team members remove sections of a fence next to Lenahan's residence.

For the inhabitants of 331 NW 25th St. in Corvallis, Tuesday didn't begin like just another day.

Between 7:30 and 8 a.m., they were being evacuated from their home by the Corvallis Police Department, responding to a 911 call placed by one of the residents who had recently been threatened with a knife by the man living in the basement apartment of the house.

The suspect, Nathan M. Lenahan, stormed to the upstairs apartment that morning and forced entry, then began pounding on the bedroom door of one of the inhabitants, OSU student Ryan Spidal, who was asleep at the time.

According to Spidal and Lieutenant Dave Henslee of the CPD, Lenahan then kicked the door open and entered, threatening Spidal with a knife.

"I woke up to him pounding on my door and he kicked it open and said, 'Why are you listening to me?' inferring that I was listening to his conversation or something," Spidal said. "He had a knife in his hand and he said, 'I hope to god that you're not listening to me because I would have to kill you.'"

Spidal then told Lenahan to leave his room, to which he complied, only to come back minutes later, pleading with Spidal not to call the police and insisting that he hadn't meant to be so violent.

After Lenahan left the second time, Spidal went to one of his roommates and asked him to call the police. "I was frazzled from the experience," Spidal said.

According to Henslee, the CPD responded to the call at around 7:30 a.m. and tried to detain the suspect, who had locked himself in the basement apartment and refused to come out. The CPD then called in the Oregon State Police, who came between 9 and 9:30 a.m. with a SWAT team in an effort to negotiate with Lenahan and get him to exit the premises.

"We want this to end peacefully," Lt. Henslee said during the ordeal when he broke the story so far to reporters. "We're not going to use force unless we absolutely have to." Henslee added that there wasn't a specific timeframe in mind for extricating the suspect from the house.

By this time, due in part to OSU's Emergency Alert System e-mails, text messages and phone calls, a crowd of between 50 and 100 people and several news crews had flocked to the scene and stood behind police lines to learn the latest news.

"We were woken up around 8 a.m. and told to leave the house, that it was unsafe," said Nico Minor, an onlooker who is also a resident of 331 NW 25th St.

The OSP spent several hours trying to negotiate with Lenahan, who refused to leave the basement, while SWAT teams surrounded the house, armed and ready. After gaining a search warrant that enabled them to enter the house, they eventually broke through a basement window, Tasered the suspect and arrested him.

Cassondra Pittman, a senior in pre-dentistry, saw the entire arrest from her kitchen across the alleyway. She described Lenahan as "screaming for God's help".

"He called the sheriff the 'Antichrist,'" Pittman said. "They were yelling at him on a loudspeaker, saying 'Come out, we're your friends!' And he said that God told him not to come out."

Pittman said that Lenahan resisted arrest as much as possible, speaking quickly about religion and God while screaming that the officers were hurting him and telling them to stop. She added that when the officers asked whether or not he had any weapons or sharp objects on him, the suspect pointed to his belt. When the officers removed the belt, the suspect became severely distraught and demanded it back.

According to Spidal, Lenahan is the landowner's son and is known around the neighborhood as "Creepy Van Man" because of the old van that he drives, which is allegedly rumored to have a cage, handcuffs and duct tape in the back.

"He keeps weird hours and is always really cautious if he's on the phone. We never see anybody with him," Spidal said.

"There's something mentally wrong - he must be paranoid. Maybe he's doing something illegal. Who knows what's going on down in the basement," Spidal said.

Lenahan will be held at Benton County Correctional Facility and faces charges of burglary in the first degree, menacing, coercion and unlawful use of a weapon.



Candice Ruud, news editor

news@dailybarometer.com, 737-2231

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