Pics and Vid: Gunman Killed After Nearly Three-Hour Standoff with SWAT Outside Florida Courthouse

A gun-wielding man was killed during a standoff with a SWAT team Friday morning outside a courthouse in Viera, Fla., on the east coast of the state.

Deputies surrounded the gunman just after 10:30 a.m. near the Brevard County Courthouse in Viera, about an hour southeast of Orlando. A Palm Bay police negotiator was speaking with the gunman, reported WESH-TV in Orlando.

Image source: WESH-TV 

The gunman also had a bag with him. "We don’t know what the other contents of the bag are. It's laying nearby where he is standing at," Brevard County Sheriff Wayne Ivey told WESH before the shooting.

Video depicted the gunman pacing near the courthouse — which was placed on lockdown — while at least eight officers trained their guns on him and took cover behind vehicles. Two snipers aimed their weapons at the gunman from a roof.

Just before 1 p.m., SWAT officers got behind an armored truck and moved toward the gunman, who then tried running away but was killed in resulting gunfire. It's not clear exactly at this time who fired the fatal shot.

"We don’t know what he is agitated over," Ivey told WESH of the unidentified gunman before the fatal shots were fired, adding that he'd made previous threats at the courthouse, although none serious enough to call for an arrest.

Occupants of the courthouse were moved to the back of the building during the standoff and deputies were working to evacuate them.

Here's raw news footage of gunman pacing outside the courthouse: