PARIS, TX--"There was information that we had gathered, during the standoff that this might be a BB gun or a pellet gun or something like that," Paris Police Chief, Bob Hundley, said.

According to Hundley, officers had no way of knowing that the gun Stevens held to his own head was just a pellet gun.

That paired with rumors that Stevens wanted to be involved in a "cop assisted suicide," along with Stevens' erratic behavior and violent past, made it difficult for law enforcement to anticipate his actions.

"Didn't want to come out, when he would come out he would have the gun pointed at his head, once I saw it in his mouth, he came out of the car about three or four times," Lamar County Sheriff, B.J. McCoy, said.

Earlier Sunday, a woman ran into a convenience store in Boswell Oklahoma claiming to have been beaten, raped and kidnapped by Stevens.

She said he'd stolen her car and drove off.

That car was spotted on highway 19/24 outside Paris, Texas and officers started pursuit, laying down spike strips to stop Stevens. That's when standoff began.

Sheriff McCoy says they set a 2am deadline before they planned to go into the vehicle and apprehend Stevens, but around 11:30pm he got out of the car.

"We were going to assault the vehicle within the next two hours, but he started the vehicle on fire and came out on his own."

Stevens is facing charges of evading arrest, aggravated assault of a police officer--for hitting one of their cars, kidnapping, and arson.

But police say they expect several additional charges, possibly federal, to come forward in the coming weeks.