Father's Hospital Standoff for Son's Life

It was a crime that made national headlines.

A father storms into a Tomball hospital armed with a gun, demanding

that something be done to save his son, who was on life support.

We covered this story for you back in January.

That father is now out of jail, and his son, who the family believed

was brain dead, is now alive and well.

Tonight, both men are talking only on 2, telling investigator Robert Arnold

their incredible story.

I felt hopeless.

11 months ago, George Pickering was in a very different place in his life.

He was in jail, charged with two counts of aggravated

assault with a deadly weapon.

Hey, we need the police stat to the hospital.

We have a f- a family member with a gun.

In January, Pickering grabbed a gun, marched into Tomball Regional Medical

Center,

and became locked in an hours-long standoff with police.

Staff at the hospital told police Pickering threatened them with that gun.

He's pointing the gun

like that.

We immediately got security and called 911.

Pickering's son, George III, was in the critical care unit on life

support.

He had a history of seizures, but this time he suffered a massive

stroke.

They were saying that he was brain dead, he was a vegetable.

The hospital ordered something called a terminal wean, a process that

slowly removes life support. Hospital staff even notified an

organ donation organization to let them know Pickering's son was an

organ donor.

They were moving too fast, the hospital, the nurses,

the doctors.

Pickering admits he was extremely drunk and belligerent

that night, but he says he

was certain there was still life left in his son,

and no one would

listen. He also says he had been down this road

once before with his son,

and he came back.

I knew if I had three or four hours that night, that, that I would know

whether George was brain dead or not.

While Pickering initially had a gun, he was quickly disarmed by his other

son, but continued threats prompted the

standoff.

Pickering stayed at his son's bedside as SWAT officers tried to negotiate

his surrender. Then, something happened.

During that three hours, George squeezed my hand three or four

times on command.

Seeing that his son was recovering, Pickering surrendered.

There was a law broken,

but it was broken for all the right reasons.

I'm here now because of it.

This is George Pickering III, the man family members say they were told

would not recover from his stroke and coma.

It's the duty of a parent to protect your children,

and that's all he did.

Pickering says he and his dad share an unbreakable bond.

They run a small electrical engineering business, and even built their home

together.

Everything good that made me a man

is because of that man sitting next to me.

As for the criminal charges against Pickering, one was dismissed, the

other lessened. He was given credit for the time he served in

jail and was

released this month. Phoebe Smith was Pickering's attorney.

And this case has always been about a father protecting his son when his son

couldn't protect himself.

And with the criminal case over, father and son say all they want now

is to live

their lives peacefully.

The important thing is I'm alive and well, my

father's home,

and we're together.

It was good to come home.

There's no place like home.

Officials at Tomball Regional Medical Center cited privacy laws

when declining to

speak about Pickering's case. The hospital did write, "When a person

is in a

position to make a decision for someone who can't make those decisions for

themselves, they must do so in a safe manner." You can

read that

full statement on click2houston.com under the Investigates section.

Robert Arnold, KPRC, Channel Two News.