2 arrested after gun shop standoff ID'd

TULLYTOWN, Pa. (WPVI) -- The two men arrested following a standoff at a Bucks County gun shop have been identified.

22-yo James Townes and 21-yo Ashire Williams appeared before a judge on Monday afternoon following the early morning incident in Tullytown.

The two are accused of breaking into Mike's Gun Shop in by hacking a manhole size opening through the roof right around 2:30 a.m.

The security system alerted police who quickly arrive with ATF agents and a SWAT team.

A seven hour standoff ensued.

Investigators eventually made entry only to discover these two would-be thieves were trying to get away by crawling through the ventilation system between the roof and the drop ceiling, with the intent of escaping from the attached pizza shop next-door.

"We started pulling down the ceiling, we borrowed some equipment from the fire department. We just started pulling the drop ceiling down - it was inevitable we were going to find them," said Chief Daniel Doyle of the Tullytown Police Department.

Investigators made the arrests but that pizza shop, Ariana's Pizza, was trashed in the process. Xavier Vera, who owns the pizzeria, says he simply cannot believe what happened.

"Everything is destroyed and now I feel like I lost everything. I don't know how many days were are going to be closed," Vera said. "Hopefully we fix everything and get it back to running."

The suspects were arraigned on a string of charges including burglary. Vera says he's just happy no one was injured during this ordeal.

"It's good that they caught those guys," he said. "All of this can be fixed."

The standoff prompted authorities to delay the opening of all schools in the Pennsbury School District by 2 hours. And all morning pre-kindergarten sessions in the district were cancelled.

At one point police received a 911 call reporting a body found nearby. They now believe that report was false, and that the suspect phoned it in in order to distract police and draw them away from the scene.