Ok, men, this one's a zoo, and it isn't going to get any better. The self declared militia group America Now has taken real estate heir James Betincourt Junior and Lawrence Adams, his general contractor, hostage. Apparently they were touring a current project, the Old Granite Hotel, and were taken while inspecting Adams' work. Now the suspects are holed up on the top two floors of the hotel, demanding twelve million dollars ransom by midnight. They claim that Betincourt Investments owes this as a downpayment on their debt to the American People.

America Now is a small but active domestic militia group. They are fiercely isolationist, opposing immigration, free trade, and foreign owned interests. Most of their previous actions have been against foreign owned properties, either sabotaging them in the building stage or engaging in serious vandalism, making the properties too expensive to maintain. This is their first kidnapping, and it may indicate a shift in the group's tactics. Given the public nature of the incident, the group is clearly looking for publicity as well. We've spoken with the media, and received some co-operation; however, it's not clear how long that will last.

Expect the America Now suspects to be well equipped, and to act as a group, but their inexperience with hostages may make them even more dangerous to the civilians. Take extra care.

Now...on to the victims. James Betincourt Junior is the son of the CEO and majority owner of Betincourt Investments, a French based property development company. Six months ago, they purchased the Granite out of bankruptcy for twelve million dollars, and have been renovating it ever since. Junior has been in charge of the renovations, and was doing an inspection of the renovation work when he was captured. Lawrence Adams is the general contractor and the architect in charge of doing the renovation work.

The suspects are on the top two floors of the hotel, the sixth and the seventh. You'll find the blueprints on the board. We've cut power to the elevators, and one of them is trapped between the fifth and sixth floor. You can either go up the stairs, or down the elevator shaft. Recent gunshots were reported coming from the seventh floor, so it's time to go in.