Nova Scotia man with imitation rifle arrested after police standoff

An RCMP vehicle is pictured in an undated image. (File photo)

A 42-year-old man is facing a number of charges following an incident in Nova Scotia’s Colchester County.

Colchester County District RCMP say a man barricaded himself inside a home in Hilden, N.S., Thursday after police received complaints that a man had allegedly threatened to burn down a house, while also exposing himself to several people, including children.

Police say a complaint was called in around 7:40 p.m. and as officers were responding they were told the man had then armed himself with a rifle and a standoff occurred.

Colchester County District RCMP officers responded to the call along with assistance from the RCMP Emergency Response Team and officers from three other RCMP detachments.

RCMP updated the public on Twitter that they had the suspect contained to a property on Kennedy Road in Hilden, which is located 23 kilometres south of Truro.

RCMP said officers had established communication with the barricaded man and they were considering whether they needed to send out an emergency alert at the time, but instead they asked the public to avoid the area while they worked to resolve the situation.

Around 9:50 p.m., RCMP tweeted that the suspect was safely taken into police custody by the RCMP ERT team and was taken to the Bible Hill RCMP detachment.

Police say there was nobody else inside the home at the time and the firearm involved was an Air Soft rifle which police described as an imitation firearm.

Police charged 42-year-old Andrew William Kolstee of Brookfield, N.S., with:

• two counts of uttering threats
• pointing a firearm
• using an imitation firearm
• committing an indecent act

No one was injured in the incident, but police remained on the scene Friday and executed a search warrant and located another imitation firearm.

Kolstee remains in custody and is scheduled appear in Truro provincial court on Monday at 9:30 a.m.