BUTTERNUTS – “Today looked like a scene out of the movies. It started with a heavy police presence in town followed by a helicopter patrolling the sky,” said Wendy Bovee Oldham on The Evening Sun’s Facebook page. “I watched a helicopter land next to my house at the fishing access.” She said a man dressed in camouflage jumped from the helicopter with what she thought looked like a type of machine gun in his hand.

This response stemmed from a multi-agency search for four individuals in the New Berlin/South New Berlin/Butternuts area on Wednesday.

New York State Police responded to a residence on County Route 18 in the Town of Butternuts in Otsego County at approximately 2:48 p.m. for a 911 call of a home invasion burglary.

It was reported that four subject stole property, then fled from the residence into a wooded area.

“One of the subjects was reported to be armed with a handgun,” says a release from the New York State Police. Warnings were issued to town residents to stay inside and lock their doors.

Oldham recalled that the helicopter continued to circle above the town and the armored vehicle on the ground. “There were police everywhere, and they started putting up road blocks for vehicle searches,” she said.