Police use of gas to end standoff goes awry, spreading further than expected in building
Police engaged in a nightlong standoff Friday in Cambridge after a man wielded a machete in Central Square and made it to his home in The Port neighborhood, according to police and police scanner reports.
In an effort to get the barricaded man out of his home, police used gas that sent several sickened residents fleeing instead.
The first reports of a man with weaponry in Central Square came before 6:45 p.m.; the standoff at 243 Broadway, a building run by the affordable-housing developer Just A Start, lasted several hours, going well past 2:30 a.m. with the man still in his home…