Vietnam Vet Jimmy Lee Dykes Fatally Shoots Bus Driver Charles A. Poland Jr, Kidnaps 5 Year Old Ethan Gilman And Holds Him Hostage In Underground Bunker UPDATE: Child OK!!, Gunman DEAD!

MIDLAND CITY, Ala. — Police SWAT teams and hostage negotiators were locked in a standoff Wednesday with a gunman authorities say intercepted a school bus, killed the driver, snatched a 6-year-old boy and retreated into a bunker at his home with the kindergartener.

The gunman, identified by neighbors as Jimmy Lee Dykes, a 65-year-old retired truck driver, was known as a menacing figure who once beat a dog to death with a lead pipe, threatened to shoot children for setting foot on his property and patrolled his yard at night with a flashlight and a shotgun.

He had been scheduled to appear in court Wednesday morning to answer charges he shot at his neighbors in a dispute last month over a speed bump.

The standoff dragged on through the night and into the afternoon Wednesday after the gunman boarded a stopped school bus filled with children in the small town of Midland City, population 2,300, on Tuesday afternoon, authorities said.

Sheriff Wally Olsen said the man shot the bus driver when he refused to hand over a 6-year-old child. The gunman then took the kindergartener away.

Dykes was believed to be holed up with the boy in an underground bunker of the sort used to take shelter from a tornado.

"As far as we know there is no relation at all. He just wanted a child for a hostage situation," said Michael Senn, a church pastor who helped comfort the traumatized children after the attack.

The bus driver, Charles Albert Poland Jr., 66, was hailed by locals as a hero who gave his life to protect 21 students.

About 50 vehicles from federal, state and local agencies were clustered Wednesday at the end of a dirt road near Dykes' home. Authorities gave no details on the standoff, and it was unclear whether they were in contact with Dykes or he had made any demands.


Homes nearby were evacuated after authorities found what was believed to be a bomb on his property.

Mike and Patricia Smith, who live across the street from Dykes and whose two children were on the bus when the shooting happened, said their youngsters had a run-in with him about 10 months ago.

"My bulldogs got loose and went over there," Patricia Smith said. "The children went to get them. He threatened to shoot them if they came back."

"He's very paranoid," her husband said. "He goes around in his yard at night with a flashlight and shotgun."

"Everybody up the hill tried to avoid him," he said.

Patricia Smith said her children told her what happened on the bus: Two other children had just been dropped off and the Smith children were next. Dykes stepped onto the bus and grabbed the door so the driver couldn't close it. Dykes told the driver he wanted two boys, 6 to 8 years old, without saying why.

According to Smith, Dykes started down the aisle of the bus and the driver put his arm out to block him. Dykes fired four shots at Poland with a handgun, Smith said.

"He did give his life, saving children," Mike Smith said.

Patricia Smith said her daughter, a high school senior, began corralling the other children and headed for the back of the bus while Dykes and the driver were arguing. Later, Smith's son ran inside his house, telling his mother: "The crazy man across the street shot the bus driver and Mr. Poland won't wake up."

Patricia Smith ran over to the bus and saw the driver slumped over in his seat. Her daughter used another child's cellphone to call 911.

Another neighbor, Ronda Wilbur, said Dykes beat her 120-pound dog with a lead pipe for coming onto his side of the dirt road. The dog died a week later.

"He said his only regret was he didn't beat him to death all the way," Wilbur said. She called animal control, who came out and talked to Dykes, but nothing else happened. "If a man can kill a dog, and beat it with a lead pipe and brag about it, it's nothing until it's going to be people."

Dykes had been scheduled to appear in court Wednesday to face a charge of menacing some neighbors as they drove by his house weeks ago. Claudia Davis said he yelled and fired shots at her, her son and her baby grandson over damage Dykes claimed their pickup truck did to a makeshift speed bump in the dirt road. No one was hurt.

"Before this happened, I would see him at several places and he would just stare a hole through me," Davis said. "On Monday I saw him at a laundromat and he seen me when I was getting in my truck, and he just stared and stared and stared at me."
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Midland City, Alabama (CNN) -- Neighbors of Jimmy Lee Dykes say he was supposed to have been in court on Wednesday, facing charges that he'd shot at them during a December argument over the dirt road that separated their properties.
Instead, he was holed up in an underground bunker dug into his yard, surrounded by sheriff's deputies, state troopers and police.
Also inside the bunker, authorities say, is a 6-year-old boy seized from a school bus at gunpoint Tuesday afternoon. The bus driver, 66-year-old Charles Poland Jr., was shot and killed, but school officials said Wednesday he saved 21 other children on board.
Authorities have not released the name of the suspected gunman. But neighbors Jimmy Davis and his mother, Claudia Davis, identified him as Dykes, as have news outlets around Midland City, about 90 miles south of Montgomery.
Late Tuesday, authorities were communicating with the suspect through a PVC pipe, CNN affiliate WSFA reported.
Adding to the tension was the fact that the child needs medication that has to be taken daily, CNN affiliate WDHN reported. Investigators were able to send the child's medication down the pipe into the bunker and also determine that the boy had not been physically harmed, WDHN reported.
Jimmy Davis told CNN he'd spotted the hole Dykes was digging on his property when Dykes moved in down the road from him. The 65-year-old Dykes was friendly and welcoming, and said the hole was being dug as a storm shelter.
Davis, who works a night shift, said Dykes worked on his bunker in the middle of the night -- every other night, between 2 and 3 a.m., for a year-and-a-half.
Davis was in the process of moving out in December when his truck -- hauling a trailer -- dug ruts into the dirt speed bump Dykes had built up across the road, Claudia Davis told CNN. Dykes "got mad about what he saw" and stopped their truck to complain as they returned, she said.
Jimmy Davis says Dykes was standing by the side of the road, yelling and cursing at them, as they approached. He says he tried to calm the man down, but Dykes ran to his nearby van and got a pistol. Claudia Davis said Dykes fired two shots at the truck -- which also carried her 6-month-old granddaughter -- as it sped away.
Jimmy Davis swore out a complaint related to the incident against Dykes in December. Dykes was supposed to appear in court Wednesday in nearby Ozark to face a charge of menacing, a misdemeanor that carries penalties of up to six months in jail, according to the Davises.
Tuesday's standoff began about 3:40 p.m. (4:40 p.m. ET) near a church in Midland City. Authorities have since expanded an evacuation area in an effort to protect nearby residents.
Michael Senn, a local pastor, told WSFA that he spoke to several students who had been on the bus. He said a girl described the shooter getting aboard.
"He told most of them to get off the bus," Senn related. "And then he grabbed a little boy and shot the bus driver four times."
Donny Bynum, the superintendent of Dale County schools, said Poland had been a full-time bus driver for four years and was "well loved by all of us here." In a written statement Wednesday morning, he said Poland "gave his life to protect 21 students who are now home safely with their families."
"Emotions are high, and it's a struggle for us all to make sense of something so senseless, but let us keep this young student, his family, and Mr. Poland's family in our thoughts and prayers," he said.
Mike Creel, another neighbor, said some of the children who escaped the bus recounted that the susppect initially demanded two children.
"The one child he got ahold of actually fainted," Creel told WSFA. "That was the reason he was able to grab him. And now he is hidden in his homemade bomb shelter."
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OMG!

By Amber Sutton | [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]
on January 30, 2013 at 5:56 PM, updated January 30, 2013 at 6:18 PM

MIDLAND CITY, Alabama -- Negotiators continue talks with a man accused of killing a school bus driver on Tuesday, kidnapping a 6-year-old, and taking refuge in a bunker.

More than 24 hours later, he remains holed up and surrounded by local, state and federal officers.

During a media briefing at 5 p.m., Dale County Sheriff Wally Olson gave few details, but said the child is believed unharmed and that talks at the bunker near Destiny Church continue.

A hostage negotiator with the Federal Bureau of Investigation is said to be speaking with Jimmy Lee Dykes, 65, through a PVC pipe leading to the bunker, reportedly built recently as the man became more erratic and possibly violent.

Dykes is accused of killing Charles Albert Poland Jr., 66, a Dale County bus driver. Poland thwarted efforts to take two children but snatched the reportedly autistic 6-year-old.

"Details on this situation are limited," Olson said this evening,"but I can assure you negotiators continue to communicate with the suspect. At this time, we have no reason to believe the child has been harmed."

Agencies involved include the Midland City Police Department, Dothan Police Department, Federal Bureau of Investigations, Alabama Department of Public Safety and the Dale County Sheriff's Department, according to Olson.

The Alabama Bureau of Investigations will take the lead on any criminal cases, the sheriff said.

Olson said he was grateful for support shown to officers during the past 24 hours. "On behalf of the Dale County Sheriff's Department, I want to thank all of the agencies that are involved, volunteers and community for the overwhelming support we've received."

Olson said the next scheduled media briefing will be at 10 p.m.

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This poor child is Still holed up with that nutcase. The parents must be frantic!! Horrific!

I was so hoping they would have gotten the boy out by now. I wonder if they are talking to the boy and know hes ok?

Sure hope so!!

Check back at 11 p.m. ET for a live news conference

By Phillip Rawls | Wednesday, Jan 30, 2013 | Updated 7:36 PM PST

A gunman holed up in a bunker with a 6-year-old hostage kept law officers at bay Wednesday in an all-night, all-day standoff that began when he killed a school bus driver and dragged the boy away, authorities said.

SWAT teams took up positions around the gunman's rural property and police negotiators tried to win the kindergartener's safe release.

The gunman, identified by neighbors as Jimmy Lee Dykes, a 65-year-old retired truck driver, was known around the neighborhood as a menacing figure who once beat a dog to death with a lead pipe, threatened to shoot children for setting foot on his property and patrolled his yard at night with a flashlight and a shotgun.

He had been scheduled to appear in court Wednesday morning to answer charges he shot at his neighbors in a dispute last month over a speed bump.

The standoff along a red dirt road began on Tuesday afternoon, after a gunman boarded a stopped school bus filled with children in the town of Midland City, population 2,300. Sheriff Wally Olson said the man shot the bus driver when he refused to hand over a 6-year-old child. The gunman then took the boy away.

"As far as we know there is no relation at all. He just wanted a child for a hostage situation," said Michael Senn, a pastor who helped comfort the traumatized children after the attack.

The bus driver, Charles Albert Poland Jr., 66, was hailed by locals as a hero who gave his life to protect 21 students.

The boy's classmates, their parents and other members of this small Bible Belt community gathered in several churches and held a candlelight vigil in the town square Wednesday evening to pray for Poland and for the boy's safety. Some in the square joined together to sing "Amazing Grace."

Authorities gave no details on the standoff, and it was unclear if Dykes made any demands from his underground bunker, which resembled a tornado shelter.

The sheriff said in a brief statement Wednesday evening that negotiators continued talking to the suspect and "at this time we have no reason to believe that the child has been harmed."

About 50 vehicles from federal, state and local agencies were clustered at the end of a dirt road near where Dykes lived in a small travel trailer. Nearby homes were evacuated after authorities found what was believed to be a bomb on his property.

State Rep. Steve Clouse, who met with authorities and visited the boy's family, said the bunker had food and electricity, and the youngster was watching TV. He said law enforcement authorities were communicating with the gunman, but he had no details on how.

At one point, authorities lowered medicine into the bunker for the boy after his captor agreed to it, Clouse said. The lawmaker said he did not know what the medicine was for or whether it was urgently needed.

Chris Voss, a former international kidnapping negotiator for the FBI, said negotiators at the scene should remain patient and calm, resisting the urge to force a quick resolution.

"Getting what you want is not the same as getting even," said Voss, whose firm, the Black Swan Group, now consults on high-stakes negotiations. "Flooding the zone will not save lives."

Mike and Patricia Smith, who live across the street from Dykes and whose two children were on the bus when the shooting happened, said their youngsters had a run-in with him about 10 months ago.

"My bulldogs got loose and went over there," Patricia Smith said. "The children went to get them. He threatened to shoot them if they came back."

"He's very paranoid," her husband said. "He goes around in his yard at night with a flashlight and shotgun."

Patricia Smith said her children told her what happened on the bus: Two other children had just been dropped off and the Smith children were next. Dykes stepped onto the bus and grabbed the door so the driver couldn't close it. Dykes told the driver he wanted two boys, 6 to 8 years old, without saying why.

According to Smith, Dykes started down the aisle of the bus and the driver put his arm out to block him. Dykes fired four shots at Poland with a handgun, Smith said.

"He did give his life, saving children," Mike Smith said.

Patricia Smith said her daughter, a high school senior, began corralling the other children and headed for the back of the bus while Dykes and the driver were arguing. Later, Smith's son ran inside his house, telling his mother: "The crazy man across the street shot the bus driver and Mr. Poland won't wake up."

Patricia Smith ran over to the bus and saw the driver slumped over in his seat. Her daughter used another child's cellphone to call 911.

Another neighbor, Ronda Wilbur, said Dykes beat her 120-pound dog with a lead pipe for coming onto his side of the dirt road. The dog died a week later.

"He said his only regret was he didn't beat him to death all the way," Wilbur said. "If a man can kill a dog, and beat it with a lead pipe and brag about it, it's nothing until it's going to be people."

Dykes had been scheduled to appear in court Wednesday to face a charge of menacing some neighbors as they drove by his house weeks ago. Claudia Davis said he yelled and fired shots at her, her son and her baby grandson over damage Dykes claimed their pickup truck did to a makeshift speed bump in the dirt road. No one was hurt.

"Before this happened, I would see him at several places and he would just stare a hole through me," Davis said. "On Monday I saw him at a laundromat and he seen me when I was getting in my truck, and he just stared and stared and stared at me."

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I so feel for that little boy AND his parents! They must be living a hell that I hope none of us ever lives!

What a nutcase. They should have locked this guy up a lot sooner. That poor kid.

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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
The family of an Alabama boy being held captive in an underground bunker by a man described as a survivalist is "holding on by a thread," a community leader said Thursday as the hostage drama stretched into a third day.
The child, identified as Ethan, 5, was kidnapped Tuesday afternoon after a man stormed a school bus and demanded the driver hand over young children. When the driver refused, the man shot and killed him and grabbed the boy, authorities said.
A disturbing picture has emerged of the suspect, whom a source close to the investigation identified to NBC News as Jimmy Lee Dykes, 65. The source said that he was a loner and survivalist who “does not trust the government” and holds “anti-American views.”

After a second night ended with no sign of progress in negotiations, Alabama state Representative Steve Clouse told TODAY: “We are all just hoping this can come to a safe end.”
The boy's family is “holding on by a thread,” he added.
Alabama state Sen. Harri-Ann Smith told TODAY that negotiators had delivered medication that the boy needed, and that he was believed to be “calm.”
Meanwhile, concerned people in the remote town of Midland City attended vigils at several local churches Wednesday night, lighting candles and praying for the boy's safe release.
“Right now the whole town seems like they're just in a mourning stage,” convenience store manager Carl McKenzie told NBC local station WSFA-TV. “I would go take that child's place if I could, just to get him out of danger.”

Authorities offered no hints to the gunman’s motive.
People in Midland City said that they had seen the suspect tirelessly digging up his own yard, even his driveway, sometimes in the middle of the night — apparently building what one man in the neighborhood described as a bomb shelter fortified by sand.
Dykes burst onto the yellow school bus about 3:40 p.m. on Tuesday, authorities said. When the driver, Charles Albert Poland Jr., 66, tried to stop Dykes from taking children off the bus, he was shot and killed. The source close to the investigation told NBC News that four spent bullets were found at the scene.

The county school system said that 21 students had made it off the bus safely, and praised Poland as a fallen hero. But the gunman made off with the one child, possibly because the boy fainted during the siege, according to WSFA.
Clouse said gratitude was being expressed for Poland's actions, telling TODAY: “He started the day as a bus driver and ended it a hero.”
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.
“It says in the Bible the meek will inherit the earth,” brother-in-law Melvin Skipper told The Dothan Eagle newspaper. “He was the meekest man I knew.”

Poland’s neighbor, Hilburn Benton, told the newspaper that Poland refused to accept payment for work on his yard two years ago. “He told me, ‘You’re my friend and you’re my neighbor. I’m not charging you a dime,’” Benton recalled.
Dykes had been due in court Wednesday morning to face a misdemeanor charge of menacing. A neighbor, James E. Davis Jr., claimed that Dykes had pointed a pistol at his truck on Dec. 10 and fired the weapon.
The Associated Press said Dykes was accused of shooting at his neighbors in a dispute over a speed bump.

Charles Albert Poland Jr., who had driven a school bus for Dale County, Ala., since 2009, was shot and killed.

The Dothan Eagle quoted another neighbor, Michael Creel, describing 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.
Another neighbor, Danny Dean, told NBC News that he had dug up his own driveway.
Rhonda Wilbur told WSFA that Dykes was a longtime source of concern in the neighborhood because “he has been like a time bomb waiting for him to go off.” Wilbur told reporters that Dykes had beaten her dog to death with a lead pipe.
A 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.
In addition to the county sheriff’s department, the FBI and a SWAT team were on the scene. A woman answering the phone at the Midland Police Department said the FBI had completely taken over and that local police were no longer involved. Authorities ordered people living nearby to leave during the standoff.
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.

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Child 'OK' as Alabama hostage ordeal enters third day

Scott Johnson and Doug Stanglin, USA TODAY7:56a.m. EST January 31, 2013

Authorities said the boy is being kept in an underground bunker with food and electricity and appeared to be unharmed

MIDLAND CITY, Ala. — A hostage standoff continued into the third day Thursday in rural Alabama where a man who kidnapped a 5-year-old boy from a school bus after killing the driver kept the child hostage in an underground bunker at his home, which was surrounded by police and SWAT teams.

Asked how long the standoff would last, Dale County Sheriff Dale County Sheriff Wally Olson told reporters early Thursday, "We have no way of knowing that right now."

Dale County authorities said the child appeared to be on good condition, despite the ordeal.

"We have no reason to believe that the child has been harmed," Olson said earlier.

State Rep. Steve Clouse, who met with authorities and visited the boy's family, said that the bunker had food and electricity, and that the boy was watching TV.

School bus driver Charles Poland Jr., 66, was shot dead Tuesday afternoon when he refused the gunman's demand that he turn over two of the 21 children aboard.(Photo: Dale County Board of Education)
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Authorities communicated with the suspect through a PVC pipe connected to the bunker, WSFA-TV reported, and were also able to pass some unidentified medicine for the boy.

Local residents attended vigils at several churches Wednesday night, lighting candles and praying for the boy's safe release, according to WSFA-TV.

A law enforcement official who is not authorized to speak to the media identified the man as 65-year-old Jimmy Lee Dykes, a retired truck driver and Navy veteran.

Sheriff's deputies had arrested Dykes on Dec. 22 and charged him with menacing for a Dec. 10 complaint, court records show. He spent four days in jail before posting the $500 bail.

His trial was to have begun Wednesday at 9 a.m.

Instead, he is accused of grabbing a 5-year-old boy off a school bus Tuesday afternoon after killing the 66-year-old bus driver, Charles Albert Poland, who had tried to block access to the vehicle.

Patricia Smith, a neighbor whose two children were on the bus, said the gunman shot Poland four times and fled with the 5-year-old. The suspect then took the boy to a homemade bunker that he had apparently been constructing for years on his nearby property.

Authorities said Dykes lives in a small trailer at the end of a red dirt road, but they gave few details about the hostage standoff or whether Dykes had made any demands.

Dale County Sheriff's Office reports Dykes is connected to the anti-government survivalist movement.

In an interview Wednesday with The Dothan Eagle, the bus driver's wife, wife, Jan Poland, recalled their ritual of sitting in their enclosed porch after he returned from driving, having coffee and watching the sun set or listening to the rain.

She said their favorite Bible verse was 2 Timothy 1:12, which she recited with their daughter, Lydia:

"For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day."
"That is what I hold onto right now." she said, clutching her daughter's hand. "God knows. He is the one who is going to have to bring closure to my heart."

Terry Howard, the interim pastor at First Assembly of God in Newton, Ala., described Poland as "a good guy" who "loved to help people."

Protecting the children "would be in his nature," he said, noting that Poland's wife is a substitute teacher.

Authorities communicated with the suspect through a PVC pipe connected to the bunker, WSFA-TV reported, and were also able to pass some unidentified medicine for the boy.

Neighbors said Dykes had lived for about a year at the residence in Midland City, population 2,300. Before that he spent time in Texas and in Panama City, Fla., The Dothan Eagle reported.

Florida Department of Law Enforcement records show he was arrested in Panama City in February 1995 and charged with improper exhibition of dangerous weapons or firearms, a misdemeanor. The charge was dismissed four months later.

The Southern Poverty Law Center's Hatewatch, which tracks radical hate groups, said Tim Byrd, chief investigator with the Dale County Sheriff's Office, described Dykes as having "anti-America" views and ties with the anti-government "survivalist" movement.

"His friends and his neighbors stated that he did not trust the government, that he was a Vietnam vet, and that he had PTSD," Byrd said, according to Hatewatch. "He was standoffish, didn't socialize or have any contact with anybody. He was a survivalist type."

Michael Creel, who lives nearby, told The Eagle that Dykes' bunker, similar to those used against tornadoes, was 4 feet wide, 6 feet long and about 8 feet deep, covered in sand.

Neighbor Mike Smith said Dykes once threatened to shoot his children when the family's dogs entered his property.

Neighbor Ronda Wilbur said Dykes was known to go out in the middle of the night to shoot birds and rabbits. She said Dykes had cut down nearly all the trees on his lot, erected a wire fence and "would go berserk" if a dog strayed onto his land.

She said her dog died of injuries after Dykes beat it with a lead pipe.

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A tense standoff between US police and a murder suspect who is holding a five-year-old boy hostage in a bunker under his house has entered its third day with no sign of an end in sight.

Police are trying to persuade a gunman identified by neighbours as Jimmy Lee Dykes, 65, to give himself up. Dykes reportedly boarded a school bus in Alabama's Dale County and was challenged by the driver, Charles Poland, 66. Dykes shot him dead and dragged the child off the vehicle to a storm shelter he had built underneath his home in Midland City.

FBI agents, Swat teams and police negotiators swooped on the area but have failed to persauade Dykes to release the child or give himself up.

Authorities were communicating with the man through a PVC water pipe. It is not clear if Dykes has made any demands.

Sheriff Wally Olson said authorities had "no reason to believe that the child has been harmed".

Dykes has allowed police to send in colouring books, crayons and an important prescription medicine to treat the boy's Asperger's syndrome and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

The boy, who police originally believed to be six years old, was snatched at random, locals believe. "As far as we know there is no relation at all. He just wanted a child for a hostage situation," local pastor Michael Senn said.

Vietnam veteran

Dykes was said by neighbours to be a former truck driver and Vietnam veteran who had moved to the 2,300-strong community of Midland City in 2011.

Neighbours said he soon revealed antisocial and violent behaviour and said he was suffering post traumatic stress disorder, a damaging psychosis resulting from a deep psychological trauma.

Sheriff's Office chief investigator Tim Byrd said Dykes was also believed to be a survivalist with anti-American views.

"His friends and his neighbours stated that he did not trust the government, that he was a Vietnam vet, and that he had PTSD," Byrd told civil rights group SPLC.

"He was standoffish, didn't socialise or have any contact with anybody. He was a survivalist type."

The day he kidnapped the child, Dykes was due to appear in court for having allegedly shot at one of his neighbours, Jimmy Davis, during a dispute over a speed bump on the road separating the two houses.

Dykes "got mad" and opened fire on Davis's truck, his neighbour told CNN. Davis's six-month-old daughter was inside the vehicle but escaped uninjured.

Dykes's neighbour, Ronda Wilbur, said the veteran beat her dog almost to death with a lead pipe because the animal was running on his property. The dog died a week later.

"He said his only regret was he didn't beat him to death [straight] away," Wilbur said.

"If a man can kill a dog, and beat it with a lead pipe and brag about it, it's nothing until it's going to be people."

In another incident Dykes threatened to shoot the children of Mike and Patricia Smith, a couple living across the road.

"My bulldogs got loose and went over there," Patricia Smith said. "The children went to get them. He threatened to shoot them if they came back.

"He's very paranoid," her husband said. "He goes around in his yard at night with a flashlight and shotgun."

Davis, a nightshift worker, said Dykes started building the bunker as soon as he moved in and used to work on it every night between 2 and 3 am.

Police believe the bunker to be equipped with electricity, food and TV but have reportedly not a clear idea of how big or deep it is.
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Watching this on HLN. The parents must be completely frantic! Unimaginable!

Midland City, Alabama (CNN) -- Somewhere underneath this red Alabama dirt is a little boy.
A kindergartener, snatched from the safety of his school bus by a gunman and stashed in an underground bunker;
What's in the bunker beside the man and the boy?
How are they keeping warm when temperatures have dipped into the 30s in the area?
Is the boy safe?
And most importantly, why him?

The gunman stormed into the school bus Tuesday afternoon and demanded that the driver hand him a child.
The driver, 66-year-old Charles Poland Jr., was a gentle Bible-reading man who could not stand to discipline the children on his bus because it hurt his heart, the Dothan Eagle newspaper reported.
When he refused the demand, police said, the gunman shot him several times as 22 horrified children scrambled for cover.
But the man was able to grab the boy and drag him to his underground bunker.
And the standoff began.
The suspect
Authorities have not released the name of the man they suspect to be the gunman. But neighbors and news outlets around Midland City identified him as Jimmy Lee Dykes, 65, a Vietnam veteran and a retired truck driver.
Neighbor Jimmy Davis told CNN that Dykes began digging a hole on his property soon after he moved in down the road from him.
Davis, who works a night shift, said Dykes worked on his bunker in the middle of the night -- every other night, between 2 and 3 a.m., for a year and a half.
He was friendly and welcoming and told Davis the hole would be a storm shelter.
Now, the bunker Dykes dug is four feet deep, and Dykes has been known to stay there for up to eight days, said James Arrington, police chief in Pinckard, Alabama.
It wasn't clear what supplies were in the bunker Thursday, Arrington said.
Tim Byrd, chief investigator with the Dale County Sheriff's Office, told the Southern Poverty Law Center's Hatewatch that Dykes was a "survivalist type" with "anti-America" views.
"His friends and his neighbors stated that he did not trust the government, that he was a Vietnam vet, and that he had PTSD," Byrd told the civil rights group. "He was standoffish, didn't socialize or have any contact with anybody."
The court date
On Wednesday, the day before the standoff began, Dykes was supposed to appear in court to answer to charges that he'd shot at Davis during a December argument over the dirt road that separated their homes.
Davis was moving out when his truck -- hauling a trailer -- dug ruts into the dirt speed bump that Dykes had built up across the road.
Dykes "got mad about what he saw" and stood by the side of the road, yelling and cursing, said Davis' mother, Claudia.
He then ran to his van, got a pistol and fired two shots at the truck, the Davises said.
Fortunately, no one was hurt, including Claudia Davis' 6-month-old daughter, who was inside.
The Wednesday court date in nearby Ozark was for menacing, a misdemeanor that carries a penalty of up to six months in jail.
Another neighbor, Ronda Wilbur, said Dykes beat her dog to death with a lead pipe and then bragged to her husband about it.
"He made it very clear that any animals or people that came onto his property would be killed," she said.
Wilbur said she complained to animal control authorities and thought that this would stop the behavior.
"He just got increasingly more bizarre," Wilbur said.
The boy
Very little information has been released about the boy.
Police and school officials have said the child is 6, but a state representative in close contact with the family said he is 5 and will turn 6 in two weeks.
One thing is for certain: the kindergartner didn't know Dykes, State Rep. Steve Clouse said.
Through a 60-foot-long PVC pipe that extends into the bunker, authorities have pleaded with the suspect to let the boy go -- to no avail.
The man agreed to let police send down coloring books, crayons and the prescription medicine the little boy desperately needs for Asperger's syndrome and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
But nothing else has changed.
As the standoff dragged into Thursday morning, the boy's parents were doing their best to hold it together.
They were "holding on by a thread," Clouse said.
The scene
Early Thursday morning, dozens of law enforcement vehicles clogged the dead-end dirt road that leads to Dykes' house. They were from local police, the FBI, even Homeland Security.
Authorities evacuated neighbors. Officials closed schools in three nearby districts for the week.
With little movement, police have been loath to share much with the media.
Authorities called off a planned news conference late Wednesday night, saying there was nothing new to report. Early Thursday morning, Dale County Sheriff Wally Olson gave reporters a similar message, but said officers and volunteers trying to resolve the situation were holding up well.
At an earlier news conference Wednesday, Olson said he had "no reason to believe that the child has been harmed."
A reporter asked what the community could do to help.
"Pray," the sheriff said.
"Pray."
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all of this because of a case of people driving too fast over a speed bump????

Sure doesn't take much. This world is going to hell in a handbasket.

By Erin Edgemon | [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]
on January 31, 2013 at 10:30 PM, updated January 31, 2013 at 10:33 PM
MIDLAND CITY, Alabama -- More than 54 hours after a man shot and killed a Dale County school bus driver and abducted a 5-year-old boy, officials remain mostly tight-lipped about the ongoing hostage negotiation.

Federal, state and law enforcement are said to be speaking with suspected hostage taker Jimmy Lee Dykes, 65, though a PVC pipe that leads into his underground bunker on his property on a private dirt road across U.S. Highway 231 in Midland City.

“These past three days have not been easy on anybody,” Dale County Sheriff Wally Olson said to reporters Thursday night. “I know details are limited but we value your patience.”

“There is no reason to believe the child has been harmed,” Olson said.

He said the main goal is to get the child out safely.

Pastor Michael Senn, of Midway Assembly of God, spoke to media again Thursday night, saying he has spoken to people who have counseled the family of the abducted child, Ethan.

“They are doing as well as can be expected,” he said.

Earlier, the Midland City mayor said he, too, had spoken to the family. "He's crying for his parents," Mayor Virgil Skipper told The Associated Press. "They are holding up good. They are praying and asking all of us to pray with them."

Senn said he didn’t know Dykes, but he was called in to speak to the children who ran from the school bus after their driver was shot and Ethan snatched.

“It seems like a random kidnapping,” he said.

Senn said children have called Ethan a “great kid. He is a lot of fun.” He said he knows Ethan likes to color and a coloring book and crayons were sent down to him along with medication for his medical condition.

All Thursday evening vehicles could be seen pulling in and out of the command post officers have set up at Destiny Church. Other movement was minimal.

Neighbors and law enforcement have told the media that Dykes is a “survivalist” and likely has enough food in his bunker to last for weeks.

Police say Ethan, the abducted boy said to have medical condition, is unharmed and has received needed medication and a coloring book and crayons he requested.

Republican Rep. Steve Clouse, who represents the Midland City area, told The Associated Press that he visited the Ethan’s mother Thursday and that she is "hanging on by a thread."

"Everybody is praying with her for the boy," he said.

Clouse told AP that Ethan’s mother told him that he has Asperger's, an autism-spectrum disorder, as well as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD. People with Asperger's are high-functioning.

Media were originally reporting Ethan had autism.

The community continues to remember slain bus driver Charles Albert Poland Jr.
Poland’s visitation will be Saturday, Feb. 2, from 5p.m.-8 p.m. at Sorrell’s Funeral Home in Slocomb. The funeral will be Sunday, Feb. 3. at 2 p.m. at the Ozark Civic Center.

Flowers are being accepted or donations can be made to the Autism Society.

Vicki Upchurch, Poland’s sister told NBC affiliate KHQ, she never expected to hear the news her brother had been killed.

"I expected them to say he had a heart attack or got in to a car wreck. Never in my wildest dreams did I think he'd get shot, and shot 4 times,” she said.

Upchurch said Poland grew up in North Idaho, and in the 1960's, he joined the Army and moved to Alabama where he married and has lived ever since.

Senn said the community is calling Poland an American hero. He gave his life to save the children riding on his school bus.

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I can't quit thinking about poor little Ethan. That poor child must be going thru' hell, if he's even alive.

Add to this that he has asperger's and ADD. This HAS to end at some point and I am praying that this lunatic gives up and does not harm that poor boy. I keep thinking of his parents/grandparent's. They have got to be going through pure hell.

Cannot believe JVM or NG have not even mentioned this.

Yeah, it's all for the ratings. Cover the Jody Arias trial 100% of the time but sure they are all concerned about what's happening to the children. Not!!!!! Jmoo.

I dont have a link because I just saw it on morning tv and my eyes arent open yet. They said they were able to send color books and medicine down for the boy and that they are talking to the guy during the day and letting him sleep at night. I bet the parents arent sleeping at night!

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The family of the Alabama bus driver killed for refusing to hand children over to a gunman is speaking out for the first time. NBC's Gabe Gutierrez reports.

By Erin McClam, Staff Writer, NBC News

An Alabama boy spent his fourth day of captivity in an underground bunker Friday with a survivalist who allegedly killed a school bus driver, but the 5-year-old has received medicine he needs, plus crayons and coloring books.

Hostage negotiators have been talking to the boy's captor through a lengthy PVC pipe, but there was no sign of progress. Police told Alabama media Thursday that the man has been known to stay in the bunker as long as eight days.

The boy, a 5-year-old named Ethan known to his mother as "Love Bug," was apparently unharmed, authorities said Thursday.

His family, which has not spoken publicly since the abduction, was "holding on by a thread," a state representative told the TODAY show. "We are all just hoping this can come to a safe end," Rep. Steve Clouse said.

Jimmy Lee Dykes, 65, a Vietnam veteran described by authorities as a loner with anti-government leanings -- and by neighbors as a paranoid menace -- is suspected of taking the boy after storming a school bus Tuesday afternoon. Bus driver Charles Albert Poland Jr., 66, was shot and killed while trying to stop the abduction.
Strangely, the two men had a brief encounter just a day before the siege, a neighbor said.

Kelly Miller, who lives next door to Dykes, told NBC affiliate WSFA that Dykes boarded Poland’s bus Monday and spoke with him. She did not know what was said.

Then on Tuesday morning, before the abduction, Poland gave Dykes a gift of eggs and marmalade to thank him for clearing off the driveway where the bus had to turn around, according to Miller.

Miller, whose sons Jessie and Jackson were able to leave the bus before the shooting, told the station that Dykes called her father to the property fence shortly afterward and gave him Poland’s gifts, saying: "Here. I don't want this."

Hours later, Miller heard shots and screams.

"Within seconds of me grasping what was going on, I knew it was Jim," she told WSFA.

A source close to the investigation said the bunker, which is on Dykes' property and was described by a neighbor as 4 feet long, 6 feet wide and 8 feet deep, was equipped with power, food, television and plenty of supplies. The source said negotiators had gotten medicine, crayons and coloring books to the boy.

Late Thursday, Dale County Sheriff Wally Olson said negotiations through the pipe were continuing.

Clouse told reporters that the boy suffered from Asperger's syndrome and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder but had been able to get his medicine while held captive.

People in the small Alabama town of Midland City, not far from the Florida line, expressed hope that prayer might help. For the negotiators it is a matter of waiting, said Clint Van Zandt, a former chief hostage negotiator for the FBI.

"He doesn't want to hurt the child. He didn't take the child to hurt him," said Van Zandt, an analyst for MSNBC. "The child is simply the means to keep law enforcement from crashing into his bunker right now."Maybe, but that could change at any time.

He added: "Time is on the side of the negotiator."

It could still be a long wait. James Arrington, police chief of the nearby town of Pinckard, told The Birmingham News that Dykes has been known to stay in his bunker as long as eight days.

The source told NBC News that the man believed to be Dykes walked onto the bus on Tuesday with a note, demanding that two children be handed over to him. The bus driver refused and was shot and killed.
Clouse said the kidnapping appeared to be random.

Neighbors in Midland City have said they saw Dykes tirelessly digging and working on the bunker. One man said it was protected by several feet of sand on top.

Poland has been hailed as a hero. The county school system said 21 children made it off the bus alive.
The driver's son, Aaron Poland, told NBC News that his father took bullets for the children on his bus as he would have for his own children.

"Every time a child got on my dad's bus, they were no longer their parents', they were his," he said.
Poland's sister, Vicki Upchurch, told NBC station KHQ in Spokane, Wash., that the driver "would have done anything to protect those kids."

Poland and his family grew up in northern Idaho, where much of the family still lives, Upchurch said.

Relatives were planning to travel from Idaho to Alabama for Poland's funeral services this weekend.

"We will get through this," Upchurch said. "My brother was very religious. He had a deep faith."

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Slys Hunny wrote:I dont have a link because I just saw it on morning tv and my eyes arent open yet. They said they were able to send color books and medicine down for the boy and that they are talking to the guy during the day and letting him sleep at night. I bet the parents arent sleeping at night!

I think if I were those parents a Dr would have to drug me so much that I'd have to sleep thru' a good part of this. I don't know where parents get the stamina to be awake and conscious of unknown things going on with their little child. They are much more brave than I could be.

MIDLAND CITY, Ala. — More than three days after authorities said a gunman shot a school bus driver dead, grabbed a kindergartner and slipped into an underground bunker, the man showed no signs Friday of turning himself over to police.

Speaking into a 4-inch-wide ventilation pipe leading to the bunker, hostage negotiators have tried to talk the gunman, identified by neighbors as Jimmy Lee Dykes, into freeing the 5-year-old boy. One local official said the child had been crying for his parents.

Dykes, a 65-year-old retired truck driver, is accused of pulling the boy from a school bus Tuesday and killing the driver who tried to protect the 21 youngsters aboard. The gunman and the boy were holed up in a small room on his property that authorities likened to a tornado shelter.

"The three past days have not been easy on anybody," Dale County Sheriff Wally Olson said late Thursday. He said authorities were communicating with the suspect. "There's no reason to believe the child has been harmed."

But there were signs that the standoff could continue for some time.

The shelter has electricity, food and TV, according to a state legislator. The police chief said the captor has been sleeping and told negotiators that he has spent long periods in the shelter before.

The shelter was about 4 feet underground, with about 6-by-8 feet of floor space and a PVC pipe that negotiators were speaking through, said James Arrington, police chief of the neighboring town of Pinckard.

"He will have to give up sooner or later because (authorities) are not leaving," Arrington said. "It's pretty small, but he's been known to stay in there eight days."

Midland City Mayor Virgil Skipper said he has been briefed by law enforcement agents and has visited with the boy's parents.

"He's crying for his parents," he said. "They are holding up good. They are praying and asking all of us to pray with them."

Republican Rep. Steve Clouse, who represents the Midland City area, said he visited the boy's mother Thursday and that she is "hanging on by a thread."

"Everybody is praying with her for the boy," he said.

Clouse said the mother told him that the boy has Asperger's syndrome, an autism-like disorder, as well as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD. Police have been delivering medication to him through the pipe, he added.

The normally quiet red clay road leading to the bunker was teemed Friday with more than a dozen police cars and trucks, a fire truck, a helicopter, officers from multiple agencies and news media near Midland City, population 2,300.

Police vehicles have come and gone steadily for hours from the command post, a small church taken over for that use

Early Friday, activity picked up when a team in military-style uniforms, many toting weapons, got out of a big van in the pre-dawn chill and moved into a staging area. One appeared to be dog handler.
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I think this w/come to an end over the weekend. Just praying Ethan will come out of this unscathed physically. Emotionally is something else.

Raine, I agree. Would have to be sedated.

(CBS/AP) MIDLAND CITY, Ala. - Police have released a photo of the man they say is holding a 5-year-old boy hostage in an underground bunker on his rural Alabama property.

Jimmy Lee Dykes, 65, allegedly shot a school bus driver to death Tuesday, grabbed the kindergartner, and slipped into the bunker, which reportedly has electricity, food, and TV.

The standoff between police and Dykes dragged into a fourth day on Friday, as authorities sought to continue delicate conversations with the man through a pipe and worked to safely end the tense situation.

Police have delivered the boy's medication through a 4-inch-wide ventilation pipe leading to the bunker.

Hostage negotiators have used the pipe to talk to the gunman, identified by neighbors as Jimmy Lee Dykes, but investigators have been tightlipped about their conversations.

Jimmy Lee Dykes / Alabama Department of Public Safety
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The survivalist who allegedly shot a school bus driver before taking a five-year-old boy hostage has said that he will release his hostage if a reporter is sent in to tell his story.
MailOnline has learned that Jimmy Lee Dykes made the extraordinary offer on the first day of what has now turned into a siege situation with the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team on site, emergency services and a host of media focused on the piece of Alabama bluff under which Dykes and the boy, Ethan, are holed up.
A source with the local sheriff's office has revealed that a CID Lieutenant spoke with Dykes for the first four hours of the hostage situation, communicating via a pipe sticking out from the ground – the only surface sign of the bunker’s location.
In those first crucial hours, Vietnam veteran Dykes attempted to strike his bargain – the boy in return for a reporter to tell his story of ‘how the government had screwed him.’
According to the source, the bunker lies beneath what appears to be landscaped garden.
There is a coi carp pond and a winding path before the ground rises to conceal two old freight containers buried beneath.

‘A lot of folks around here have that. They can’t afford the pre-made plastic ones you sink into the ground so they buy old freight containers for $2000 and dig a hole.’
The FBI had considered sinking a wire into the pipe to give them ‘eyes and ears’ in the bunker where Dykes has access to TV and a monitor linked to a camera via which he can monitor activity in his yard.
He said : ‘They decided to X-Ray the site first and they found it was wired with explosives.

‘The neighbors think he has pipe bombs in there too.’
Hostage negotiators are now communicating with Dykes via a ‘throw phone.'
With recent heavy rainfall causing flooding in the area there has been much speculation over the conditions within the bunker.
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Bus driver Charles Poland was allegedly shot while trying to prevent the gunman from hurting any children


Mileah Lomaneck and Whitley Riley light candles during a candlelight vigil honoring Poland

If there's electricity with a TV in the bunker then Dykes is able to listen to the news. I would think that if he's hearing negative talk about HIM that Ethan's life is in even more danger. MOO.

So, how does he get into his bunker? If the only sign of it is a pipe sticking up, there must not be an actual door into the ground. Curious how a reporter would get in.

You'd think they could take out his camera from somewhere above. But I suppose they don't want to irritate him further and jeopardize Ethan.

I found some photos online, there is a door on the side of a "hill" shown here:
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And there is a simulated drawing here of what the bunker may look inside in this video:
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"You'd think they could take out his camera from somewhere above. But I suppose they don't want to irritate him further and jeopardize Ethan."
That is what I'm thinking Sam. He's already down there with a five year old, one who has ADD and is hyperactive at that.
Very interesting about the door in the hill and what that bunker may look like. I am so afraid for Ethan.

He has explosives down there? OMG!

Wrap, if you can bring up the Nightline segment from tonight it was very interesting about this. FYI.

MIDLAND CITY, Ala. -- Authorities said Saturday that still have an open line of communication with an Alabama man accused of abducting a 5-year-old boy and holding him hostage in a bunker, and they thanked the suspect for taking care of the child as the standoff marked its fifth day.

Dale County Sheriff Wally Olson said in a briefing with reporters that Jimmy Lee Dykes has told them he has blankets and an electric heater in the bunker. Olson said Dykes has allowed authorities to deliver coloring books, medication and toys for the boy.

"I want to thank him for taking care of our boy," Olson said. "That's very important."

Authorities say Dykes shot a school bus driver Tuesday and took the boy to the bunker on his property in rural Midland City.

Olson would not say whether Dykes has made any demands. Olson added that he is limited in the details he can release.

FBI spokesman Jason Pack said Saturday that officials were working to establish a command center near the bunker.

Negotiators were still trying Saturday to persuade Dykes to surrender. Police have said they believe the Vietnam-era veteran fatally shot a school bus driver Tuesday, and then abducted the boy from the bus and disappeared into the home-made bunker.

While police were mostly staying mum about the delicate negotiations, it fell to neighbors to fill in the blanks about Dykes, described by some as a menacing figure with anti-government views.

One of Dykes' next-door neighbors said the suspect spent two or three months constructing the bunker, digging several feet into the ground and then building a structure of lumber and plywood, which he covered with sand and dirt.

Neighbor Michael Creel said Dykes put the plastic pipe underground from the bunker to the end of his driveway so he could hear if anyone drove up to his gate. When Dykes finished the shelter a year or so ago, he invited Creel to see it – and he did.

"He was bragging about it. He said, `Come check it out," Creel said.

He said he believes Dykes' goal with the standoff is to publicize his political beliefs.

"I believe he wants to rant and rave about politics and government," Creel said. "He's very concerned about his property. He doesn't want his stuff messed with."

Police have used a ventilation pipe to the bunker to talk to the man and deliver the boy medication for his emotional disorders, but they have not revealed how often they are in touch or what the conversations have been about. Authorities waited until Friday to confirm the suspect's identity.

While much of what is going on inside the bunker remains a mystery, local officials who have spoken to police or the boy's family have described a small room with food, electricity and a TV. And while the boy has his medication, an official also said he has been crying for his parents.

Meanwhile, Midland City residents held out hope that the standoff would end safely and mourned for the slain bus driver and his family. Candlelight vigils have been held nightly at a gazebo in front of City Hall. Residents prayed, sang songs such as "Amazing Grace" and nailed homemade wooden crosses on the gazebo's railings alongside signs that read: "We are praying for you."

"We're doing any little thing that helps show support for him," said 15-year-old Taylor Edwards said.

Former hostage negotiators said authorities must be cautious and patient as long as they are confident that the boy is unharmed. Ex-FBI hostage negotiator Clint Van Zandt advised against any drastic measures such as cutting the electricity or putting sleeping gas inside the bunker because it could agitate Dykes.

The negotiator should try to ease Dykes' anxieties over what will happen when the standoff ends, and refer to both the boy and Dykes by their first names, he said.

"I want to give him a reason to come out," Van Zandt said.

State Rep. Mike Ball of Huntsville, who spent 15 years as a hostage negotiator with the Alabama Bureau of Investigation, said Saturday that the key is patiently building a relationship with Dykes.

"They want to build a relationship with him and calm down the feeling of hopelessness he has," he said. "Any day that goes by with the child alive is a victory. If you string enough of those days together, he will come out."

At a brief news conference Friday to release a photo of Dykes, police brushed off any questions about possible charges.

"It's way too early for that," said Kevin Cook, a spokesman for the Alabama state troopers.

Police have described the bunker as about 4 feet underground, with about 6-by-8 feet of floor space and the PVC pipe that negotiators were speaking through.

State Rep. Steve Clouse, who represents the Midland City area, said he visited the boy's mother and she is "hanging on by a thread." Clouse said the mother told him that the boy has Asperger's syndrome as well as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD.

Dr. Nadine Kaslow, a family therapist and psychiatry professor at Emory University in Atlanta, said the boy's emotional troubles might make things even more difficult for him.

"They have less way to make sense of things," she said of children with Asperger's and ADHD.

The normally quiet red-clay road leading to the bunker was busy Friday with more than a dozen police cars and trucks, a fire truck, a helicopter, officers from multiple agencies and news media near Midland City. The town, population 2,300, is about 100 miles southeast of Montgomery.

Police vehicles have come and gone for hours from the command post, a small church nearby.

Neighbors said Dykes was easily angered and once beat a dog to death with a lead pipe, threatened to shoot children for setting foot on his property and patrolled his yard at night with a flashlight and a firearm.

He was in the Navy from 1964 to 1969, serving some time in Japan, according to military records.

Authorities said Dykes boarded a stopped school bus filled with 21 children on Tuesday afternoon and demanded two boys between 6 and 8 years old. When the driver tried to block his way, the gunman shot him several times and took the 5-year-old boy.

The bus driver, Charles Albert Poland Jr., 66, was hailed by local residents as a hero who gave his life to protect the pupils on his bus.

Dykes had been scheduled to appear in court Wednesday to answer charges he shot at his neighbors in a dispute last month over a speed bump. Neighbor Claudia Davis said he yelled and fired shots at her and her family over damage Dykes claimed their pickup truck did to a makeshift speed bump in the dirt road. No one was hurt.

Creel said his father and Dykes are friends. Creel said that after Dykes' arrest, Dykes wrote a 2- to 3-page letter that at least in part addressed the menacing case.

Michael Creel said he hasn't seen the letter but that his father, Greg Creel, has. Dykes reportedly told the elder Creel he had sent the letter to the local media, politicians and Alabama's governor.

Police on Friday took a copy of the letter from the Creels' home, according to Michael Creel. Reached for comment, Greg Creel confirmed the existence of the letter but declined further comment and said he was cooperating with police.

A neighbor directly across the street, Brock Parrish, said Dykes usually wore overalls and glasses and his posture was hunched-over. He said Dykes usually drove a run-down "creeper" van with some of the windows covered in aluminum foil.

Parrish often saw him digging in his yard, as if he were preparing to lay down a driveway or building foundation. He lived in a small camping trailer and patrolled his lawn at night, walking from corner to corner with a flashlight and a long gun. Authorities have not disclosed what firearms Dykes might have in his possession.
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Cannot believe this is still going on!!

By LAURA COLLINS IN MIDLAND CITY, ALABAMA
PUBLISHED: 00:00 EST, 1 February 2013 | UPDATED: 04:29 EST, 2 February 2013

Jimmy Lee Dykes, who allegedly shot a school bus driver before taking a five-year-old boy hostage, has said that he will release the boy if a reporter is sent in to tell his story
The survivalist who allegedly shot a school bus driver before taking a five-year-old boy hostage has said that he will release his hostage if a reporter is sent in to tell his story.
MailOnline has learned that Jimmy Lee Dykes made the extraordinary offer on the first day of what has now turned into a siege situation with the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team on site, emergency services and a host of media focused on the piece of Alabama bluff under which Dykes and the boy, Ethan, are holed up.
A source with the local sheriff's office has revealed that a CID Lieutenant spoke with Dykes for the first four hours of the hostage situation, communicating via a pipe sticking out from the ground – the only surface sign of the bunker’s location.
In those first crucial hours, Vietnam veteran Dykes attempted to strike his bargain – the boy in return for a reporter to tell his story of ‘how the government had screwed him.’
According to the source, the bunker lies beneath what appears to be landscaped garden.
There is a coi carp pond and a winding path before the ground rises to conceal two old freight containers buried beneath.

The door is believed to be booby trapped.

He said: ‘You would think it was just landscaped yard. It’s not that unusual to have bunkers here – he told his neighbor he was making a tornado bunker.

Dykes has been holed up in a bunker on his property with the 5-year-old child he took from the bus since the late afternoon shooting on Tuesday

The bunker where Dykes is hiding out with his 5-year-old hostage lies beneath what appears to be landscaped garden

‘A lot of folks around here have that. They can’t afford the pre-made plastic ones you sink into the ground so they buy old freight containers for $2000 and dig a hole.’

The FBI had considered sinking a wire into the pipe to give them ‘eyes and ears’ in the bunker where Dykes has access to TV and a monitor linked to a camera via which he can monitor activity in his yard.
He said : ‘They decided to X-Ray the site first and they found it was wired with explosives.

‘The neighbors think he has pipe bombs in there too.’

With recent heavy rainfall causing flooding in the area there has been much speculation over the conditions within the bunker.

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There are lots of pics at the above link..sorry if some of this has already been reported here. This is a horrible, scary situation. And, it's cold there. Something has Got to give. Just Praying they allow the letter to be published and that they send someone down there and he let's the boy go. He cannot stay down there forever..he w/run out of food eventually. Everytime I come here, I am hoping to hear good news.

By Chelsea J. Carter and George Howell, CNN
updated 11:14 PM EST, Sat February 2, 2013

Midland City, Alabama (CNN) -- Residents of Midland City, Alabama, gathered to show support and offer prayers for the family of a 5-year-old hostage held in a bunker.

Saturday marked the fifth day of an armed standoff in that town, where authorities are negotiating through a ventilation pipe with the man accused of barricading himself and the boy underground.

Police have been tight-lipped about a possible motive since the hostage drama began unfolding with the shooting of school bus driver and the abduction of the 5-year-old.

In a sign of perhaps how tense negotiations are between authorities and the suspect, officials have refused to detail what, if any, demands have been made by the suspect.

Michelle Riley, a resident of Midland City, pleaded for the suspect to let the boy -- Ethan -- go.

"He just needs to know that ... everybody makes mistakes. Everybody's been through life events that changes them, but Ethan's innocent. You know, let him go home to his mother. Let him go home to his grandparents. Let him come out to the community. Let him go back to school and be with his friends," she said.

She spoke at a Saturday vigil for the boy held outside the Midland City town hall. Residents there sang "Amazing Grace."

"I'm here in support of this family," said Deborah Trammell, also at the vigil. She explained that she lost a son five years ago in a car accident. "I can relate to this family because they've had a child all of a sudden plucked out of their lives," she said.

On Friday, the Dale County sheriff confirmed what neighbors have been saying and local news outlets have been reporting since the standoff began -- the suspected gunman's identity.

Charles Poland was fatally shot in Alabama on Tuesday.

Suspect Jimmy Lee Dykes, 65, is a Vietnam War veteran and retired truck driver.
'We don't want to make any mistakes,' Ala. governor says

He is Jimmy Lee Dykes, 65, a Vietnam veteran and retired truck driver who moved to the area about five years ago.

The sheriff's department released a photo of a gray-bearded, unsmiling Dykes and brief physical description: white male, 6 feet tall, weighing 170 pounds with brown eyes and gray hair.

Officials have been in "constant communication" with Dykes, Sheriff Wally Olson said Saturday. Dykes has told police that he has an electric heater and blankets for the boy. The sheriff publicly thanked Dykes for taking care of the child.

This much is known, according to police and witness statements: On Tuesday at about 3:40 p.m., bus driver Charles Poland Jr. was shuttling children from school to their homes when he dropped children off and the gunman boarded the bus. The gunman demanded that Poland, 66, hand over two children. Poland refused, blocking access to the bus's narrow aisle as at least 21 children escaped out of the back emergency door, according to police. The gunman shot Poland four times, killing him; grabbed the boy and then barricaded the two of them inside a nearby bunker.

It's unclear whether the gunman was after a specific child on the bus. Police have said there is no connection between the suspect and the abducted boy, whose identity is being withheld.

The suspect, who police have identified as Dykes, is holed up in a bunker 4 feet underground and built at least partially out of PVC pipe, authorities have said.

A hostage negotiator has been communicating with the alleged gunman through a 60-foot-long plastic ventilation pipe in an effort to end the standoff.

Authorities believe the boy is physically unharmed.

The suspect agreed to let police send down coloring books, crayons and prescription medication that the boy needs for treatment for Asperger's syndrome and attention deficit disorder, State Rep. Steve Clouse told CNN.
Neighbors have said the bunker has electricity, and Dykes has been known to stay in it for up to eight days, said James Arrington, the police chief in nearby Pinckard.
Dykes has been described as a self-styled survivalist with "anti-government" views, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center's Hatewatch.

The incident called to mind another bus hijacking. In 1976, three masked men boarded a school bus in Chowchilla, California, taking 26 children and their driver hostage. They were forced into a buried vehicle, where they spent 16 terrifying hours before they were able to escape.

Jennifer Hyde was on that bus. She was 9 years old, and described what happened as the end of her childhood.
"You couldn't just go on and have a normal childhood when you faced a life threatening situation like that. You just can't go on and be carefree," she told CNN's Don Lemon.

She said her heart goes out to Ethan: "I can't imagine him being alone in the situation that he's in. At least I was able to have other children with me and one adult that I knew and could trust."

As negotiations in Alabama continue, preparations were under way for Poland's funeral. Services for the late school bus driver will be held Sunday at the Ozark Civic Center. Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley praised Poland for protecting the children on his bus. "He stood in that place, and when that man came to take two children, he said no. And he lost his life because of that ... he did his job, and I'm proud of him as the governor but I'm just proud of him as a human being," he said.

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By Nadine Alfa
MIDLAND CITY, Alabama | Sat Feb 2, 2013 11:57pm EST

(Reuters) - Efforts to free a 5-year-old boy from a gunman in an underground bunker, where the man took him after killing the boy's school bus driver, were shrouded in secrecy on Saturday as the standoff in rural Alabama dragged into a fifth straight day.

Police sources said the FBI's Hostage Rescue Team was leading negotiations aimed at securing the boy's safe release.

But FBI officials have declined to comment, referring calls to local authorities who have been extremely tight-lipped, providing few official updates on the situation.

Dale County Sheriff Wally Olson, chief spokesman for local law enforcement officials in Midland City, told a brief news conference on Saturday that authorities had been in constant communication with the suspect, who was officially identified on Friday as 65-year-old Jimmy Lee Dykes.

Police believe Dykes, a retired trucker and Vietnam War veteran, fatally shot bus driver Charles Albert Poland, 66, on Tuesday and then took one of Poland's more than 20 child passengers hostage during their ride home from school.

The incident came against the backdrop of a debate about gun control that has galvanized the nation since the shooting deaths of 20 children and six adults at a Connecticut elementary school in December.

Olson declined to disclose any specific demands made by Dykes, saying only that he had allowed authorities to provide coloring books, toys and medication for the kindergartner, who reportedly suffers from autism or Asperger's syndrome.

Dykes also assured authorities he had blankets and electric heaters in the bunker to protect the boy from cold overnight temperatures, Olson said.

"I want to thank him for taking care of our child. This is very important," Olson said.

He offered no further comment but one law enforcement source, explaining perhaps why so little information is being shared with reporters, told Reuters that Dykes has access to television news inside his bunker.

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Jimmy Lee Dykes, the retired Alabama trucker who allegedly shot a school bus driver last week and has held a 5-year-old boy hostage in his underground bunker for seven days, had threatened to kill all the children on the bus before taking the boy, one of the students on the bus said.

"He said he was going to kill us, going to kill us all," Tarrica Singletary, 14, told ABC News.

"The bus driver kept saying, 'Just please get off the bus,' and [Dykes] said, 'Ah, all right, I'll get off the bus," Tarrica said. "He just tried to back up and reverse and [Dykes] pulled out the gun and he just shot him, and he just took Ethan."

Drones are flying over the homemade underground bunker this morning near Midland City, Ala., where police say Dykes is holding Ethan hostage. Officials have not released the boy's last name.

Despite days of negotiations, police say they have little to go on. Dykes, 65, has made few demands, and they still have no motive for his actions, or any sense of when the standoff might end.

"It gives them more time to study this bunker," former FBI profiler and ABC News consultant Brad Garrett said. "Does Mr. Dykes have any explosives? Has he booby trapped the doors if ever they tried to get in?"

Negotiators have been communicating with Dykes through a ventilation pipe that leads to the bunker, and have used it to send the child comfort items, including a red Hot Wheels car, coloring books, cheese crackers, potato chips and medicine.

Dykes is a decorated Vietnam vet who grew up in the area. He lived in Florida until two years ago, the AP reported, and has an adult daughter, but the two lost touch years ago, neighbor Michael Creel said. When he returned to Alabama, neighbors say he once beat a dog with a lead pipe and had threatened to shoot children who set foot on his property.

At a news conference this weekend, Dale County Sheriff Wally Olson surprised many when he thanked Dykes.

"I want to thank him for taking care of our child, that is very important," Olson said Saturday.

On Sunday, the tight-knit Midland City community buried bus driver Chuck Poland, who died protecting the children from Dykes. Hundreds came out to the funeral as they prayed for Ethan.

Cindy Steiner, who lives next door to Ethan, said his mother is worried and just wants her "loving little boy" home safe.

"Because Ethan being autistic, he has behavior problems, and she doesn't want him to get in one of those moods where he's uncontrollable," Steiner told ABC News. "She's scared what would happen."

Steiner said she had a message for Ethan.

"Hang tough, little man," she said. "We love you. We are praying for you."
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Cannot believe this raving lunatic STILL has that child. OMG!