Middletown Man Holding Toddler Son Hostage Killed by County SWAT Team

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A MAN WAS fatally shot by a member of the Monmouth County Emergency Response Team around 4:30 a.m. Wednesday, inside his rented home at 33 Bayside Parkway in the East Keansburg section of Middletown Township.
The 39-year old man, identified by police as Scott McAllister, was allegedly armed with a knife and near his 17-month old son in the house, who he allegedly was holding hostage in the house following a domestic dispute with his wife.
According to police, the negotiations with McAllister began at about 11:30 p.m. Tuesday night when the Middletown Township Police Dept. responded to a 911 call from his wife, reporting a domestic dispute in the house.
She reported that McAllister was intoxicated and had beaten her, and that he was armed with a knife and threatening their child. She fled the house. When police arrived, they found McAllister had locked himself in the house with the toddler, and refused to allow police to enter.
The Monmouth County Emergency Response Team was deployed to the scene, and according to police accounts, a hostage negotiator attempted through the night to get McAllister to surrender peacefully to police and release the child.
At approximately 4:30 a.m., the SWAT team forced entry into the house, where they found McAllister, who they believed was armed with a knife. One member of the team fired at him, fatally wounding him.
The child, who was found near McAllister, was not harmed, police said.
County police pronounced McAllister dead at the scene.
At noon Wednesday, state investigators were on the scene, sorting through potential evidence with blue gloved hands, behind yellow crime scene tape, as a dozen neighbors watched.
“I hear pop pop. I hear two gunshots. I thought it came from in the house,” said Carmine Ruocco, 51, a truck driver who lives four houses away. “I didn’t know the SWAT team went into the house and fired the shots. When I heard the shots, I immediately knew this wasn’t good.”
Ruocco and others said the incident was unusual in Ideal Beach. “It’s an isolated incident; it’s not indicative of the neighborhood,” he said.
Ron Roy, 63, a neighbor who lives two houses away, said the owner of the rented house lives in Florida. He said, “It’s surprising because nothing like this, from what I remember, ever happened in Middletown. It’s kind of like TV coming to life.”
According to police blotters published by online news sites, in 2014 McAllister, a resident of Highlands, was arrested on the same day the call came in – May 26 – but a year earlier and charged with aggravated assault, possession of a knife and criminal restraint for assaulting a friend. Two days later he was arrested for violating a temporary restraining order by returning to the scene of domestic violence. On Sept. 21, also in 2014 when he resided on Newman Springs Road in Lincroft, he was arrested and charged with simple assault.
The shooting remains under investigation by the Attorney General’s Shooting Response Team, which is made up of deputy attorney general, detectives of the Division of Criminal Justice, and detectives of the State Police Major Crimes Unit.
 
–  By Christina Johnson, with reporting by Joey Dominguez