BELFAST (AP) – A fugitive who allegedly took 11 fifth-graders hostage at gunpoint faced additional charges including kidnapping during his initial court appearance Monday.

Randall Hofland was returned to the Waldo County Jail on bail totaling $1.1 million in real estate or $300,000 cash after the judge granted a defense request that he undergo a psychological evaluation.

Hofland, 55, of Searsport, was arrested Friday at Stockton Springs Elementary School on a charge of criminal threatening with a dangerous weapon for allegedly pointing a gun at a police officer and driving away from a seat belt safety roadblock on Oct. 23.

Additional charges of kidnapping, burglary and criminal threatening with a dangerous weapon were filed on Monday in Waldo County Superior Court in connection with the hostage incident.

Hofland did not enter pleas to any of the charges. Defense attorney Jeffrey Toothaker of Ellsworth said he did not know Hofland when he was asked by a family friend to represent him while he was on the lam.

Toothaker described his new client as “very bright” but said he “has a thinking issue.” He also said Hofland told him that he wanted “to be in charge of the case.”

No one was injured at the school. A state trooper tackled Hofland in a hallway after he gave his loaded handgun to a student and left the classroom, police said.

Judge Patricia Worth set bail conditions for Hofland that would bar him from using or possessing dangerous weapons and prohibit him from entering Stockton Springs.

Hofland had been the object of a weeklong manhunt involving state and local police after he fled the traffic stop. At one point during the search, police closed a two-mile stretch of U.S. 1.

Evidence from the roadblock incident will likely be presented to the grand jury Nov. 10, District Attorney Eric Walker said.

Prosecutors planned to ask the judge to reconvene a special grand jury within the next month to consider charges arising from the hostage episode.

AP-ES-11-03-08 1638EST

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