SABATTUS – A man wanted on outstanding warrants was arrested early this morning after holding a state police tactical response team at bay from an Elm Street house for about six hours.

A dispatcher at the state police barracks in Gray said the man was arrested shortly after midnight. She had no further details.

Earlier, Kevin Woodbury of Sabattus had said the man in the house was his son, Brian, age 23.

“No shots have been fired,” state police spokesman Steve McCausland said shortly before 10 p.m., nearly four hours after the standoff started. “They’re trying to open up a channel of communication with him.”

McCausland said that three or four people who had been in the house earlier had safely left it as the situation unfolded. That happened, he said, when Sabattus police went to house for a reason that wasn’t clear Sunday evening.

McCausland said the man holed up in the house refused to leave, and police learned there was a possibility of firearms being in the house. That prompted the heavy police response, McCausland said.

Scores of state troopers made their way to the quiet residential neighborhood starting shortly after 6 p.m. By late Sunday night, McCausland said probably more than 20 troopers and negotiators were at the scene.

They were augmented by a half-dozen Androscoggin County sheriff’s deputies, four Lewiston police officers, two from Lisbon and Sabattus police.

Earlier, as the sun was setting, several troopers could be seen taking rifles or shotguns from the trunks of their cruisers and putting on body armor.

Sheriff’s deputies cordoned off access to the area, rerouting traffic from Elm Street onto Lake Street, where vehicles could turn around and head back into town.

Dozens of people milled about on sidewalks in groups of two, three and up to a half- dozen, watching police as troopers continued to make their way past the cruiser blocking Elm Street. Just beyond the hill and out of sight was the house, surrounded by police in uniform and wearing camouflage fatigues.

McCausland said state police were attempting to communicate with the man in the house.

Kevin Woodbury and his wife, Donna, were among those waiting near the roadblock for word of what was going on just out of their sight.

“The police ain’t telling us nothing,” Kevin Woodbury said.

He and his wife expressed frustration and anger with the situation. They said police allowed them to walk to the crest of the hill, but then wouldn’t allow them to try to talk with their son by bullhorn or other means.

He said his son wasn’t answering a telephone that rings into the house at that time.

He said his son “has some outstanding warrants, but not for anything serious.”

Woodbury said he thinks his son might have been refusing to leave the house because his girlfriend is pregnant, and he doesn’t want to be in jail when the baby is born.

“He should have taken care of those things,” Woodbury said of the outstanding warrants.

McCausland said that typically, trained negotiators will establish contact with someone holed up in a house, then try to talk the person into coming out unarmed, allowing the standoff to end without anyone being hurt.

“Each situation is different,” he said, but usually parents would not be called in to help with negotiations.