Report of armed, barricaded person shuts down Valencia (updated)

UPDATE 3/13/17: The incident involving an armed and barricaded suspect that shut down parts of Valencia Street for hours Friday started with a visit from a pest control company, police said.

Shortly before 2 p.m., an exterminator and the manager of the building, on the 500 block of Valencia Street, went  to Samantha Helstrom’s second floor unit, and she opened the door and pointed a handgun at them, said San Francisco Police Sgt. Michael Andraychak.

As negotiators communicated with Helstrom, 57, from the street, she stepped out of her apartment at around 6:45 p.m., confronting officers in the hallway and stating several times, “kill me,” Andraychak said. When Helstrom advanced, the officers fired less-than-lethal weapons, striking her with foam batons, he said.

Helstrom went back into her apartment where she remained until just after 9 p.m. when she stepped out and surrendered, Andraychak said. She was booked on suspicion of criminal threats, a felony, and brandishing a weapon, a misdemeanor.

Samantha Helstrom (Photo courtesy of the San Francisco Police Department)

ORIGINAL POST: An armed person has been barricaded for hours this afternoon in a building near 16th and Valencia streets, according to police, who have shut surrounding blocks down.

As of about 5 p.m., Valencia Street remained taped off between 15th and 18th streets. A hostage negotiating team began attempting to contact the armed suspect, who is barricaded in a building between 16th and 17th streets, sometime before 3 p.m., police said.

According to Mission Local, which spoke with neighbors, the subject is a woman and she is inside the Crown Hotel, at 528 Valencia. Below is a video from a patron of nearby Thanh Tam II who said the Vietnamese restaurant was on lockdown until police told people to run out.

Cops told us we were “in line of fire” of SF #Valencia lockdown then had us run into street by ourselves pic.twitter.com/eKEuUTvNPv

— Rebecca Pierce (@aptly_engineerd) March 10, 2017