Fistfight With Family Dog Escalates to 8-hour Standoff with Cops
Santa Barbara – In what must surely fall into the “one dumb thing leads to another” column, Nicola Zeno Mollo Jr., 39, began the day of January 8th by angrily punching his family’s 4-month old puppy. When one of his family members tried to dissuade him from this misdirected canine training protocol, he summarily whipped out a pistol and threatened to kill the 61-year old woman. Apparently exhibiting a remaining shred of personal self control, Mollo didn’t pull the trigger, but simply kicked her down a flight of stairs, breaking her ankle and inflicting what Santa Barbara Police Department Public Information Officer Sgt. Riley Harwood described to the media as “multiple injuries.”
Once the injured woman was treated at the local hospital and a police report of Mollo’s assault was made, Mollo—whom Harwood described as “known to the authorities with a history of violence”—became the subject of an arrest and search warrant. Because of Mollo’s reputation for affiliation with an outlaw motorcycle gang and his prior use of a firearm, SBPD’s SWAT and Crisis Negotiation Response Team were recruited into the service of the warrants.
Some six hours following the punching-the-dog-kicking-grandma-down-the-stairs incident, SWAT was in place at Mollo’s residence with all other occupants and nearby neighbors evacuated from the area. Once contacted, Mollo informed all within earshot that he was armed with an assault rifle and was prepared to defend himself against any intrusion. At that time, further neighborhood evacuations were ordered, and the area around the residence was cordoned off to all vehicular and pedestrian traffic.
“SBPD crisis negotiators communicated intermittently with Mollo for approximately three hours,” Harwood reported, whereupon tear gas grenades were fired into the residence, tactical officers invaded the home, shot him with a non-lethal projectile and were then confronted by Mollo wielding a machete. Further negotiations with Mollo ensued, and he peacefully surrendered some 14 hours after he’d punched out the family dog.
When the entered the residence immediately thereafter, officers realized Mollo had filled the residence with gas from the kitchen stove with a candle burning openly with the apparent intention of replicating a scene created by Matt Damon’s character in “The Bourne Identity”. But movies are movies and real life is much less spectacular; Santa Barbara City Fire Department units cleared the danger and Mollo was transported to Santa Barbara County Jail where he was booked without bail on charges of assault with a deadly weapon, battery resulting in bodily injury, brandishing a firearm, felon in possession of a firearm, terrorist threats, and animal cruelty.
With Mollo remaining in custody, the dog is, in all likelihood, resting comfortably at this time.
Photo: Courtesy Santa Barbara County Jail Booking
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