A cryptic message from a man at a California bank was the beginning of a 15-hour hostage situation

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. — Freddy Arredondo was in line at Chase Bank Tuesday afternoon chatting with a greeter when a man came up to him.

"It's a bad day to be in the bank," the man said.

Thinking the man was making small talk, Arredondo responded: "No, it's not that bad, it's not that packed."

But the man repeated himself and added, "Today's your last day on Earth, you guys are going to die today," Arredondo recalled.

Arredondo and the greeter froze.

The man demanded everyone's attention. Then, he pulled out a trigger from under his shirt connected to wires attached to a vest, Arredondo said.

"I have a bomb," Arredondo recalls the man saying. "I need you guys to all get on the floor."

The man, 41-year-old Anthony Scott Searles-Harris, who authorities say is a dishonorably discharged Army veteran and convicted sex offender, went on to take 10 hostages on the second floor of the building in downtown Bakersfield, some 100 miles north of Los Angeles, according to the Bakersfield Police Department.

A roughly 15-hour standoff ensued – with people tied up and desperate communication coming in from a hostage's dying phone – before he was killed in a confrontation with the FBI Wednesday morning, authorities said.

The hostages were eventually safely recovered, including two who were released on Tuesday during authorities' negotiations with Searles-Harris, law enforcement officials said.

Bank customers flee and call 911

What happened after Searles-Harris announced he had a bomb was hazy for Arredondo, who said it felt like he "blacked out" as the man continued to make demands.

He kept screaming, "Get on the floor now, get on the floor now," Arredondo said.

Arredondo refused, staring at the man with tears welling up in his eyes. "I was like 'Dude, I have a family, I can't,'" he told CNN Wednesday.

"I kept thinking to myself, 'listen Freddy, listen to him,' but at the same time my body was like, 'no,'" Arredondo said.

The man told the hostages he had "a dead man's switch" – a device that would kill them all if he released it, Arredondo said.

Every time the man looked away, Arredondo and others at the bank would take a step back, and he'd scream at them to "stop moving."

When the man turned his attention to another group, Arredondo saw an opening: he and other patrons and employees ran out of the building.

Arredondo jumped to the side, expecting the building to blow up, then called 9-1-1. As he was on the phone, he saw a police officer and yelled, "There's a bomb in there."

Arredondo's call was one in a stream of calls authorities had started receiving around 1 p.m. about a man with a bomb at the Chase Bank building.

Inside the building, a terrifying hourslong ordeal was just beginning for those who couldn't get out.

Searles-Harris had barricaded himself on the building's second floor, which houses the offices of the Kern County school superintendent's administration.

He tied up five hostages while five others hid and never encountered Searles-Harris, the FBI said. He had apparent explosives attached to himself and to some of the hostages.

The FBI was called in around 1:30 p.m. and SWAT teams, crisis negotiators and bomb techs descended on the scene as authorities evacuated surrounding buildings and began negotiating with Searles-Harris on the phone.

Diabetic hostage communicates with authorities

During negotiations, Searles-Harris – who records show was convicted in 2014 of two sex offenses involving a child – expressed concerns about how the court case was handled, Bakersfield Assistant Police Chief Jeremy Blakemore said during a news conference Wednesday.

Over the past two months, Searles-Harris had become increasingly standoffish and withdrawn, his neighbor Jimmy Smith told CNN Wednesday.

"He had asked for early on that notoriety of having FBI involved as well, and FBI negotiators," Sid Patel, special agent in charge of the FBI Sacramento field office, said at the news conference.

He had a "criminal history of using weapons to commit violent offenses," Patel said.

The man wanted to see materials related to his case, which authorities provided in exchange for the release of the hostages. Finally, around 4 p.m. Tuesday, Searles-Harris released one of the hostages. About four hours later, he released a second hostage.

Negotiations eventually stalled, and Searles-Harris refused to release more hostages, Blakemore said. As the standoff stretched into the night and early morning, hostages' families waited to hear their loved ones were safe.

Authorities became increasingly concerned about one hostage's health issues. They were able to get medicine to the diabetic hostage, who had been communicating with them until her phone died.

"We knew that this is a loss of life situation for that particular hostage that was taken if we didn't act sooner than later," Patel said.

At 2 a.m. Wednesday, the elite FBI hostage rescue team from Quantico took over the scene.

'I can't stop seeing that guy's face'

Searles-Harris was killed at about 4:30 a.m. Wednesday after the FBI team entered the building, prompted by his "erratic behavior" and concerns about the hostage's health, Patel said.

Authorities found multiple improvised explosive devices at the scene and were doing further testing on them Wednesday. A motive for the incident is under investigation, Blakemore said.

All the hostages were reunited with their families Wednesday, Blakemore said.

Arredondo was happy to be home with his wife and two daughters Tuesday, but said he couldn't sleep that night, different scenarios playing out in his mind.

"I can't stop seeing that guy's face, the way he was talking, his cold eyes. He almost looked dead but so enthusiastic, he was just so amped at the same time," Arredondo said.

"It's just one of those things we have to carry for life."

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