Crouching low, Kevlar-outfitted officers had dragged the boy behind police lines. But he was a lost cause. Jonston's concern right then was the rest of the family. As far as he knew, the other three-father, mother and daughter-were still alive inside. He intended to keep them that way.

"It's been too long," Jonston mused.

Cameras whirred all around. Some were network. The curse of being so close to Washington.

A few men were clustered around him. SWAT-team members, hostage negotiators and other detectives. The microphones were far enough away that they couldn't pick up his words.

"Let's do it," Jonston whispered gruffly. "Take them out if you have to. Whatever force is necessary to save the family. I don't want any more dead. Understood?"

There was not a single questioning word.

The assault began less than three minutes later. Tear-gas canisters were launched through front and side windows. A split second later, doors were kicked open simultaneously in kitchen, garage, basement and front hall.

Two men went in through the shattered livingroom picture window, rolling to alert crouches on the glass-covered floor.

Though their timed movements were textbook perfect, none of the efforts made by police were necessary.

The first men in the living room found the Anderson family. The father was piled in a corner, dead from an apparent beating to the head.

The mother and eight-year-old daughter were on the couch. Each had a clear plastic garbage bag over her head. The mother's had been tied with a bathrobe belt, the daughter's with a short extension cord. Warm mist from their last, desperate breaths clung to the interior of the bags. Their sightless eyes gazed in horror at the vacant air before them.

Across the room the television played; silently turned to a channel covering the hostage story. Although the power to the home had been cut, the TV was plugged into a black battery box. A retractable silver antenna wobbled in the smoky air.