GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) — A man accused of holding a woman captive and torturing her died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound after a standoff with police Tuesday night.
Police say additional information will be released Wednesday.
Benjamin Obadiah Foster, 36, tried to kill the victim in Grants Pass while “intentionally torturing” her and secretly confining her “in a place where she was not likely to be found,” Josephine County District Attorney Joshua Eastman wrote in a court document.
Grants Pass Police Lt. Jeff Hattersley told KTVL-TV Tuesday evening that Foster was underneath the house in Grants Pass and that police were trying to get him to surrender.
Just before 8 p.m., Hattersley said the situation was resolved. He told the news outlet he could not confirm at the time whether Foster was arrested.
Hattersley said on Tuesday afternoon that authorities received “credible information” that Foster had entered the home where the woman was found unconscious, bound and near death on Jan. 24, The Daily Courier reported. She was hospitalized in critical condition.
Officers from four agencies concentrated in the area, set up a command post and assembled a SWAT team, according to the newspaper. Some area residents received a notification to shelter in place.
Foster was spotted Tuesday morning walking a dog in the Grants Pass area, according to a Grants Pass Police Department Facebook post.
Last Thursday, law enforcement raided a property in the unincorporated community of Wolf Creek, but Foster, who had been staying on family property there, slipped away. Forested mountains surround the community, but investigators believe that instead of disappearing solo into the wilderness, Foster had help getting out of the area.
Grants Pass is a town of some 40,000 in southwest Oregon next to Interstate 5.
In 2019, before moving to Oregon, Foster held his then-girlfriend captive inside her Las Vegas apartment for two weeks. He initially was charged with five felonies, including assault and battery, and faced decades in prison upon conviction.
Foster reached a deal with Clark County prosecutors in August 2021 that allowed him to plead guilty to one felony count of battery and a misdemeanor count of battery constituting domestic violence.
A judge sentenced him to up to 2 1/2 years in a Nevada prison. But after the 729 days he had spent in jail awaiting trial were factored into his punishment, Foster was left to serve less than 200 additional days in state custody.