Alaska man runs onto frozen lake to avoid jail

[May 17, 2013]  ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) -- Anchorage police say a young man who didn't want to return to jail ran out onto the uncertain ice of an Alaska lake to escape officers armed with an arrest warrant.

Police spokeswoman Dani Myren says officers were sufficiently concerned about the thickness of the ice covering Cheney lake that none of them wanted to venture onto it. So a standoff ensued.

KTUU-TV reports (http://is.gd/4WCBub) that police negotiators and Fire Department dive teams were staging on the lakeshore when the young man finally surrendered late Thursday afternoon.

Myren says officers went to a home earlier in the afternoon to serve 19-year-old Siaosi Sila with a warrant alleging failure to comply with probation conditions. The spokeswoman says Sila saw police as he approached the home in a vehicle, bailed out and headed for the lake.

It wasn't immediately clear why he was on probation.

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Information from: KTUU-TV, http://www.ktuu.com/

[Associated Press]

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