As soon as patrolman Eric Burrage put on a pair of headphones inside a cramped hostage negotiation command-center trailer in Germantown on Thursday, the drill looked like a scene from the movies and started to feel like one of the real-life situations officers deal with several times a year in this city. An officer playing the role of a suspect holding his wife and children hostage inside of a car at Cameron Brown Park told Burrage the only way he would let his wife leave him was in a body bag. Burrage, practicing his negotiation skills and learning to use the high-tech equipment at his disposal, tried to talk to faux suspect down while other officers gathered intelligence and worked to come up with a strategy to allow for a peaceful end to a high-stress situation.
