The Wall Street Journal has assembled this account from interviews and exclusive access to audio and video recordings, drone images, private letters, police photographs and law-enforcement documents.

On Jan. 29, 2013, a volatile man with a grudge against the government kidnapped a 5-year-old boy from a school bus in Midland City, Ala., and held him by force in an underground bunker. It was one of the most difficult and dangerous hostage cases ever handled by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

There was nobody in Jimmy Lee Dykes’s life to take the edge off his anger.

He had long ago lost touch with an ex-wife and two daughters. His older girl recalled his fondness of firearms and a hatred of authorities; how he smelled of spearmint, coffee and cigarettes; how he beat her mother.

Mr. Dykes, a Vietnam veteran, worked as a land surveyor and a truck driver. He was fired from his last hauling job after a dispute with his boss and at age 65 ended up living on the edge of a peanut field in a town of 2,400 in southeastern Alabama, growing vegetables and collecting grievances.

Metal cattle gates opened to his acre-and-a-half property, located at the crest of a rutted, red-dirt road. He landscaped with cinder block and laid out a pond and garden. Mostly, though, his land resembled a scrub-covered parking lot for his maroon-and-silver Econoline van, a 40-foot shipping container and, up on blocks, his home, a scruffy trailer left over from a federal disaster-relief program.

In jeans and a T-shirt, with lightning-strike white hair, Mr. Dykes roamed his property shooting grasshoppers with a pellet gun. He talked about putting out bowls of antifreeze to poison neighborhood dogs that soiled his property.

In early 2012, Mr. Dykes drove his next-door neighbor, Michael Creel, to the Wal-Mart and spent the ride fuming over a new gun law. On the return trip, Mr. Dykes mused about taking people hostage in a church some Sunday until a reporter broadcast his views against the law.

Mr. Creel told Mr. Dykes nobody would listen to a man holding hostages. The two men drove home in stony silence.

A sheriff’s deputy once intervened in a spat over Mr. Dykes’ claim to pecans that fell on the roadside from another man’s tree. For Mr. Dykes, the confrontation was one more complaint against a world that had done him wrong and was too stupid to know it. “All the boys at the top, they s— on all of the people at the bottom,” Mr. Dykes told the deputy.

Video: Dale County Deputy Sheriff Mason Bynum records Jim Dykes arguing with a property owner over who has the right to fallen pecans on a public roadside. (0:37) All videos produced by Gabe Johnson/The Wall Street Journal

In 2012, Mr. Dykes hired Mr. Creel to help dig an underground bunker. The men spent weeks clawing through dense red clay. They lined the walls with joists and wood panels. Mr. Dykes worked from dawn to dusk on what he told Mr. Creel was a storm shelter. He talked about surviving hurricanes in Florida.

When they were done, Mr. Dykes asked Mr. Creel to climb inside. “Scream real loud,” Mr. Dykes said. “I want to see if I can hear you.” Then he walked away. Mr. Creel figured his neighbor wanted to see if yelling would bring help should a tree fall and block the hatch on top of the bunker. He found it odd that Mr. Dykes seemed pleased voices couldn’t penetrate the thick earth.

Over the years, Mr. Dykes had been arrested for drugs, drunken driving, assault and larceny. He was due in court on Jan. 30, 2013, to face a misdemeanor charge: He had built a speed bump to slow a neighbor’s sports car, an obstacle that led to a confrontation and allegations Mr. Dykes brandished a firearm.

Mr. Dykes didn’t show up for his court date. Instead, he boarded the school bus, grabbed a boy and carried him to his bunker.

On the afternoon of Monday, Jan. 28, school bus driver Chuck Poland turned off the highway at Destiny Church, a windowless prefabricated metal building with a small steeple. He steered his orange bus 350 yards up the rutted red dirt of Private Road 1539 to drop off the children who lived at the top of the rise.

Then he backed into a driveway that Mr. Dykes had recently cleared in a cluster of laurel oak.

Mr. Dykes approached the bus door, and Mr. Poland thanked him for making room to turn around. “I figured you’d appreciate that,” Mr. Dykes said.

“Hey, do you like broccoli and carrots?” he continued.

“I like broccoli,” the driver said.

“All right,” Mr. Dykes said, “I’ll catch you tomorrow then.”

3:32 PM

Mr. Poland: How are you doing, sir?

Mr. Dykes: Pretty good. How do you like your new drive?

Mr. Poland: I like that. I appreciate it.

Mr. Dykes: I figured you'd appreciate that.

Mr. Poland: Yeah.

Mr. Poland: [Unintelligible]

Mr. Poland: OK.

Mr. Dykes: Hey, do you like broccoli and carrots?

Mr. Poland: I like broccoli.

Mr. Dykes: Alright, I'll catch you tomorrow then.

Mr. Poland: OK. Audio and Transcript Conversation between Messrs. Dykes and Poland

As a young man, Mr. Poland had served as an Army helicopter mechanic. Now 66 years old, the stocky, bearded grandfather took pride in keeping his bus well-maintained and his young passengers in line.

At night, he watched footage from the bus security camera and noted the students who got out of hand. He would warn them the first time, and turn them in if they transgressed again.

Riding back to the highway that day, the children chattered about the unusual visit from the stranger. Mr. Poland explained the kind act: “He dug all of this out while we was on Christmas break to fix this turnaround for us.”

DAY ONE

Mr. Poland told his wife that Mr. Dykes seemed like a man in need of a friend. So the next morning, Tuesday, Jan. 29, Mr. Poland left a dozen fresh eggs and a jar of homemade muscadine grape jelly in the front seat of Mr. Dykes’s van, along with a note.

“Sorry I missed you,” Mr. Poland wrote. “See you later.”

Mr. Dykes gave the jelly to a neighbor and kept the note in his wallet, next to a scrap of paper with phone numbers for the White House and U.S. Senate, as well as a receipt for a handgun seized by police 13 years earlier.

At 3:32 p.m., Mr. Poland, wearing his usual suspenders, again backed his bus into the turnaround by the laurel oak trees. He saw Mr. Dykes approach, carrying, as promised, a plastic Wal-Mart bag overflowing with broccoli.

Mr. Poland opened the door. Mr. Dykes, wearing bluejeans, sunglasses and a green baseball cap, climbed aboard and pulled out a Ruger pistol.

He handed Mr. Poland a neatly printed letter that began: “I have a story to tell.” It ordered Mr. Poland to select two well-behaved boys with no mental or physical problems and to cuff them together with a black zip tie.

“No harm will come to the kids,” the letter said. “When the story is finished, they will go free and I will die.”

Mr. Dykes promised consequences if Mr. Poland refused.

“I don’t want to shoot you,” he told the driver. “I want two kids, six to eight years old. I mean it. Right now. Right now. Two kids. Six to eight years old. Get it. Get it. Make a move, I’ll shoot ya. Do it.”

“Sorry,” Mr. Poland said in an even voice. “You’re going to have to shoot me.”

The children ducked down behind seats and then popped up to see what was happening. Tré Watts, 16 years old, was in the second-to-last row. He stopped playing NBA JAM on his iPhone and called 911.

“Where is your emergency?” asked the operator, Brittin Norris.

“We’re on the bus and someone’s trying to take our kids,” Tré said.

“Somebody on the bus is trying to take a kid?” Ms. Norris said.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Mr. Dykes, pistol in one hand and zip tie in the other, summoned several children forward—a boy in red, a girl in the back seat. No one budged.

Then he turned to Ethan Gilman. The 5-year-old boy was impulsive and easily distracted. His mother told people he was autistic, which is why he was in the front seat, under Mr. Poland’s watchful eye. Ethan was heavy for his age. He was frightened of stairs.

“Come here, come on, come on,” Mr. Dykes yelled at the boy.

“He’s scared to death,” Mr. Poland objected.

“You will not be harmed, son,” Mr. Dykes said.

Mr. Poland stayed in his seat and wouldn’t let anyone move.

“I’m going to have to shoot you now,” Mr. Dykes yelled. “Go on. I don’t have any time. The goddamn law is coming. Come on. Don’t! Don’t!”

Mr. Poland, in a steady, quiet voice, said: “I can’t do it. I can’t.”

Mr. Dykes fired one shot. Mr. Poland let out a cry. The bus rolled backward through the trees, shadows fluttering over the seats. Four seconds later, Mr. Dykes fired another shot, then three more.

Mr. Poland slumped against the side window, blood seeping through his T-shirt. The bus slowed to a halt.

The 911 operator heard the children scream.

“Oh, my gosh. What’s going on?” she asked Tré.

“The bus driver’s dead,” Tré said.

“The what?”

“The bus driver’s dead.”

“Hang in there, baby, hang in there,” Ms. Norris told him. “Just get down.”

Mr. Dykes tore Ethan from his seat and wrestled him down the bus stairs. He hoisted the boy onto his shoulder and carried him away. “Mama,” a girl bawled. “Mommy!”

Warning: Disturbing Content

This video shows footage from inside the bus that contains disturbing images and language, including the audio of gun shots that killed the driver and scenes of children in distress. Play Bus Video 3:32 PM

911: 911. Where is your emergency?

Tré Watts: I don’t know. We’re on the bus and someone’s trying to take our kids.

911: Somebody on the bus is trying to take a kid?

Tré: Yes, ma’am. We’re on Dale County route bus 04-2.

911: OK, where are you at?

Tré: We’re near Destiny Church down this dirt road. He has a gun.

911: He has a gun?

Tré: Yes, ma’am.

911: Who has a gun?

Tré: This man.

911: OK, and you’re on a bus?

Tré: Yes, ma’am.

911: By Destiny Church Road?

Tré: Yes, ma’am. No, it’s by Destiny Church.

911: And you’re on a dirt road? Do you know the name of the dirt road?

Tré: No, ma’am. It’s just a long dirt road.

911: Where is the guy with the gun now?

Tré: He’s at the bus door saying “Give me the kids.”

911: He’s at the bus door?

Tré: Yes, ma’am. Yes, ma’am.

911: (to room)

A kid on the bus called saying there’s a guy with a gun trying to get in the school bus.

911: Private Road 1539?

Tré: Ma’am, I don’t know. It’s just a long road. I just moved here a month ago.

911: And what’s the guy with the gun doing now?

Tré: He’s just asking for two boys.

911: Tell me what the guy with the gun’s doing again?

Tré: He’s asking for kids.

911: He’s asking for kids?

Tré: Yes, ma’am.

911: Has he made it onto the bus?

Tré: Yes, ma’am.

911: Is he asking for a certain child, like his child, or just wanting kids in general?

Tré: No, ma’am.

911: What’s the description of the guy with the gun?

Tré: He’s tall, white, has sunglasses on.

911: OK, a white male with sunglasses. What’s he wearing?

Tré: I don’t know.

911: You’re very brave. You’re doing good, OK?

Tré: Thank you.

911: Is he wearing like a dark shirt, light shirt?

Tré: I don’t know.

911: You’re too scared to look. I got ya.

911: (to room)

He’s wearing sunglasses. He’s a white male. He says he can’t tell. Too scared to look. Tall.

911: (to room)

He does have a gun.

911: What’s he doing now, honey?

Tré: He’s just screaming at the bus driver.

911: He’s talking to the bus driver?

Tré: Yes, ma’am.

911: He’s aiming the gun at the bus driver?

Tré: Yes, ma’am.

911: OK, what’s the number of your bus again you said?

Tré: 04-2.

911: 04-2.

911: (to room)

It's 04-2. White male.

911: Hang in there with me, OK?

911: (to room)

He said it’s a long dirt road.

911: About how far down the dirt road are you, baby?

Tré: Just a little bit. Like, you’ll see us if you come down the dirt road.

911: He said we’ll see you down the dirt road, once you pull down.

911: (to room)

So not too far. Yeah, he said it was right by Destiny Church.

911: Hang in there, OK. What’s he doing now?

Tré: He’s yelling. He says the law’s coming.

911: He’s yelling because the law’s coming?

Tré: Yes, ma’am.

911: (to room)

He’s yelling the law’s coming.

[Children screaming]

911: Oh my gosh, what’s going on?

Tré: The bus driver’s dead.

911: The what?

Tré: The bus driver’s dead.

911: (to room)

The bus driver’s dead. The bus driver’s been shot. Oh, my gosh.

911: Hang in there, baby, hang in there. Just get down. Get down.

Tré: OK.

911: I’m still here, baby. OK? Hang in there. Hang in there. They’re coming as fast as they can.

Tré: OK. He forced. Alright. He’s coming.

911: He’s what, baby?

[Children screaming]

911: What’s he doing now, honey?

Tré: He took a kid. He took a kid.

911: (to room)

He took a kid. He’s got a kid.

[unintelligible]

911: Just stay down.

[Children screaming]

911: Hang in there, baby, hang in there. He’s taking a kid off the bus? Is he leaving the bus?

911: (to room)

Poor kid.

Tré: He’s running with the kid now.

911: What’s he doing now? Is he still on the bus or did he take the kid off the bus?

Tré: The bus driver’s dead.

911: He took the kid off the bus?

Tré: [Unintelligible] right now.

911: You see the officers now?

Tré: I’m still watching him.

911: Ok, is he still on the bus or did he take the kid off the bus?

Tré: He took the kid off the bus.

911: (to room)

He took the kid off the bus.

911: Is the bus driver the only person that was shot?

Tré: Ma’am?

911: Was the bus driver the only person that was shot?

Tré: Yes, ma’am.

911: (to room)

OK, the bus driver is the only person that was shot.

911: Hang in there, honey. You’re doing so good. I’m so proud of you, OK?

Tré: Excuse me.

911: Is he on a vehicle?

Tré: Yes, ma’am.

911: What kind of car?

Tré: He’s not on a vehicle. He’s not on a vehicle.

911: (to room)

Not on a vehicle.

911: Which way did he go, honey?

Tré: I’m off the bus. I’m off the bus. He went down the dirt road. I know which way he went.

911: Did he go towards the church or the other way?

Tré: He went the other way. Please, just come this way.

911: (to room)

He went the opposite of the church.

911: Hang on. They’re coming, honey. They’re coming as fast as they can, baby. I promise. I promise.

Tré: Please hurry.

911: They’re coming. Honey, everybody’s coming.

Tré: 'Cause he’s already running with the kid.

Tré: (yelling to someone at the scene)

Watch that way. He ran that way. A man with a gun. He took a kid. Yes, ma’am, he’s that way. Yes, I'm on the phone with them right now.

911: What’s your name, son?

Tré: Tré Watts.

911: Tré Watts?

Tré: Yes, ma’am. I’m in Dale County High School.

911: OK, and how old are you, honey?

Tré: Sixteen.

Tré: (to someone at the scene) He went this way. He went this way behind the trailer. He’s got a boy with a gun.

911: He went behind the trailer?

Tré: Yes.

Tré: (to someone at the scene) Look, look, if you come this way I can point you in the way he went.

911: OK, he’s going to be right there.

911: (to room)

[unintelligible] 16-year-old boy.

911: Are you white or black, honey?

Tré: I’m black. I have a black jacket on.

911: (to room)

[unintelligible] black jacket on...Sixteen years old...He can point them.

911: You’re doing so good, Tré. You’re doing so good.

Tré: Thank you.

911: You saved a lot of lives, honey. You did good.

911: Do you see anything now?

Tré: No, ma’am. Just some kids standing out on the street because they ran off the bus.

911: OK, the kids are running towards the church now?

Tré: Yes. They’re waving their arms and everything.

911: (to room)

OK, the kids are running towards the church. The kids that were on the bus.

Tré: I hear the sirens. I hear them.

911: OK, you hear them now?

Tré: Yes. And they’re going to turn down this dirt road where there’s a stop sign.

911: (to room)

OK, turn down the dirt road where there’s a stop sign.

Tré: Yes, they’re turning right now.

911: Is the bus driver still on the bus?

Tré: Yes, he’s dead.

911: Bless your heart, honey. You’re doing so good. I’m so proud of you.

Tré: The cops stopped at the end of the dirt road.

911: OK. They need to come past the school bus and heads towards the trailer?

Tré: They need to come my way. They need to come my way. I’m down the dirt road.

911: What color is the trailer, honey?

Tré: Uh, the trailer is white. It’s all the way at the end of the road.

911: (to room)

White trailer, close to the end of the road.

Tré: There’s the man. There’s the man. It is. He’s right there at the end of the road.

911: You see him?

Tré: Yes, ma’am. Tell them to come.

911: (to room)

Tell them to go past the school bus and head towards the white trailer. And he sees the guy now.

Tré: Hurry.

911: He’s coming, honey. They’re going. They're going.

Tré: (to someone at the scene)

What? The man? The bus driver – he’s dead. Yeah.

911: What? What did you say, honey?

Tré: Nothing. I’m talking to the cops.

911: Hold on.

Tré: (to police)

He’s up the road.

911: He’s running up the road?

Tré: No, the cops are already there.

911: Did you get a better look at him with the clothes and everything when he did take off?

Tré: No, ma’am.

911: Did he have a light shirt? Dark shirt?

Tré: Uh, he had a hat on.

911: He had a hat on? What color hat, honey?

Tré: I think it was light blue.

911: What, honey?

Tré: I think it was light blue.

911: (to room)

OK, he thinks he has a light blue hat on.

911: Do you know if he had a dark shirt on or a light shirt?

Tré: Umm, I think he had a… I don’t know what color shirt he had on. All I know is he had black sunglasses on, and he had a gun and he took a child.

911: OK, they’ve got the suspect on the phone. On 911. He’s in an underground bunker.

911: (to room)

He’s got a light blue hat on. That’s all I got.

911: Tré, you did so good. Honey, what do you see now, OK?

Tré: I see all these cars coming up, the cop cars coming up. They’re getting their guns out of the car right now.

911: OK, you just get as far away from it as you can, honey. You did wonderful. I’m so proud of you.

Tré: Thank you.

911: You did really, really good.

Tré: Thank you.

911: Thank you, baby. Do you want me to stay on the phone with you?

Tré: No, ma’am. I’m going to call my dad right now.

911: OK.

Tré: OK.

911: He’ll be so proud of you honey. You did great. + – Disturbing Content: Bus Video As Jim Dykes entered the bus and demanded hostages from driver Charles Poland, a student called 911. Full Audio and Transcript of 911 Call Student Tré Watts described the scene to the 911 operator. Mr. Dykes's Letter to Mr. Poland Jim Dykes demanded two ‘smart, well mannered, good’ children.

Two girls moved toward the driver. “Mr. Poland,” they screamed. He didn’t respond. The students clambered off the bus and ran down the dirt road toward Destiny Church.

Mr. Dykes was winded by the time he had maneuvered Ethan into the underground hideout. He, too, called 911.

“I have a hostage,” he said between jagged breaths. “…I’m in an underground bunker.”

3:32 PM

911: 911. Where is your emergency?

911: (to room)

Medic one.

911: 911.

Mr. Dykes: Yes, this is Jim Dykes.

911: I’m sorry?

Mr. Dykes: This is Jim Dykes. I'm at 1539...

911: (to room)

502.

Mr. Dykes: This is Jim Dykes. I'm at 1539 Private Road.

911: (to room)

502. You're screaming. We can't understand you.

Mr. Dykes: I’m at 1539 Private Road.

911: Yes, OK, yes sir. What’s going on?

Mr. Dykes: I have a hostage.

911: (to room)

I have the suspect on the phone.

Mr. Dykes: I shot the school bus driver because he did not do, he did not do what I needed him to do.

911: Sir, what’s wrong? What’s going on?

Mr. Dykes: I have a, just come to, come to lot 256. At the front gate, you will find a white post that you can talk through on, you can talk through. I’m in an underground bunker.

911: You’re in an underground bunker. OK sir. You have a child with you?

Mr. Dykes: Yes.

911: OK. What’s your name, sir?

Mr. Dykes: Jim Dykes.

911: OK sir. Where are you? What’s your address?

Mr. Dykes: 256 Private Road 1539

911: (to room)

I’m simulcasting.

911: OK, sir. Sir.

Mr. Dykes: Yes.

911: (to emergency services)

Attention all units. Be advised I have suspect on 911. 256 private road 1539. 256 Private Road 1539. Is armed, does have the child hostage, he’s in an underground bunker and a white post.

911: Sir? Sir? Sir – is the child harmed? Hello?

911: (to room)

I just lost the guy.

[Call ends]

[Phone ringing]

911: 911, where is your emergency?

Mr. Dykes: Yes, this is Jim Dykes again.

911: Yes, sir.

Mr. Dykes: When the cops, when the cops get here, they can talk to me. They can talk with me. They stop at the front gate. They can stop there and talk to a white post, a white PVC pipe sticking up. And I can talk through that pipe to them. I won’t be talking any more on the phone, OK. Talk to me through that pipe, got it?

911: OK, sir, sir, sir.

Mr. Dykes: The boy’s fine. The boy’s fine. Don’t worry the kid will be fine. I’m sorry I had to shoot that bus driver, but he would not do it. I asked him please, nobody would be harmed. But he just wouldn’t do it. I told him there wouldn’t be any harm to anybody. And there will not be any harm to the kid. But I’ve got, I've got to speak. I’m gonna say something. But I’ve had enough of this talking here. But they can talk to me through the PVC pipe. And then we’ll go from there. OK - I won’t be talking on the phone anymore.

911: OK. Audio and Transcript Mr. Dykes calls 911 after taking a hostage

The call cut off, and Mr. Dykes rang back. He told the operator that police could talk to him only through a white PVC pipe by the front gate.

The 4-inch-wide pipe emerged straight out of the ground about 5 feet and then turned 90 degrees, like a periscope.

The bunker was about 170 feet away, behind Mr. Dykes’s trailer, his van and the shipping container. It lay beneath a raised mound of earth secured on one side by a waist-high cinder-block wall. The entrance on top was covered by a heavy wooden hatch, about 2 feet by 4 feet, and accessible by a six-step cinder-block staircase.

Lt. Bill Rafferty, a sheriff’s deputy in neighboring Houston County, was among the first officers to arrive.

Mr. Dykes’s warning carried through the PVC pipe. Try taking his hideout by force, Mr. Dykes told Lt. Rafferty, and there will be “a loud boom.”

Mr. Dykes asked whether the bus driver had survived. Lt. Rafferty knew Mr. Poland had died but said he wasn’t sure. “If he had just done what I told him to,” Mr. Dykes said through the pipe, “I wouldn’t have had to shoot him.”

Over the next few hours, local deputies were joined by state troopers, city police and SWAT teams. The first FBI negotiator arrived at 8:09 p.m.

At 9 p.m., Mr. Dykes announced he was done talking for the night.

Mr. Creel, the neighbor, told police Mr. Dykes had worked on the bunker for a year or more. Mr. Creel gave a rough description of the interior: From the hatch, a fixed wooden ladder angled down a narrow shaft to a small alcove. The adjacent 6-foot by 8-foot underground box was tall enough for a man to stand.

Agents wanted to know what Mr. Dykes was doing inside. The PVC pipe, they thought, might provide a way to slip in a camera or microphone.

Around midnight, as a cold rain fell, Agent Mike Harris dropped to his stomach in the dirt by the gate to examine the PVC tube. Next to him an FBI negotiator sat in a folding chair, in case Mr. Dykes wanted to talk.

“There’s something in this pipe,” Mr. Harris told the negotiator.

A bomb-disposal expert brought over an X-ray machine and saw the pipe contained a bomb made of gunpowder and shotgun pellets. The trigger was a cord that ran through the pipe to the bunker.

Mr. Harris suspected Mr. Dykes planned to kill the FBI negotiators.

Then, scanning the area, agents saw a dozen or more PVC pipes sprouting out of the ground. The Dykes property suddenly looked like a minefield.

DAY TWO

The bomb changed everything. In the early morning, officers evacuated neighbors. The FBI placed a speaker and microphone on a stand next to the pipe, allowing agents to talk with Mr. Dykes from a safe distance without letting him know that they had discovered his booby trap.

What else does he have in store? wondered Wally Olson, sheriff of Dale County. Sheriff Olson, 40 years old, grew up on John Wayne Westerns and had always pictured himself wearing a badge. Since he was elected sheriff in 2006, he had busted mom-and-pop meth labs, put down a jail uprising and broken up a fraud plot involving a stripper, a sonogram and the kidnapping of a baby.

He was closely acquainted with the joys and woes of Dale County. Everybody knew Wally, and Wally knew everybody. At the barbecue joint, he was the first to jump up with a wad of napkins if someone spilled a drink. Local businessmen asked his advice when a son or daughter got hooked on drugs.

Sheriff Olson now watched an army of FBI agents, state troopers, deputies and police assemble in the parking lot of Destiny Church.

That afternoon, a Boeing 727 with blacked-out windows landed in nearby Dothan, Ala., carrying an FBI Critical Incident Response unit. Aboard were criminal profilers to analyze Mr. Dykes’s personality; bomb-sniffing dogs and attack dogs; technicians trained to see and hear activities behind locked doors; and crisis managers to make sure agents were fed and housed.

They were joined on the flight by members of the FBI Hostage Rescue Team, elite agents whose work straddled commando and cop. The men set up camp across the highway from Destiny Church, in a rat-infested building that over the years had seen service as an antique store, restaurant and strip club. If negotiations failed, they would be called to retrieve Ethan, the kidnapped boy.

The FBI agent in charge, Steve Richardson, warned Sheriff Olson that the rescue team could wield sharp elbows. He and the sheriff agreed on a joint command team, including a state police officer, to make major decisions.

Sheriff Olson was relieved to see the cavalry arrive. He soon realized they found the standoff as perplexing as he did.

A hostage rescue is a step into a trap, and Mr. Dykes had built his trap carefully. The underground bunker didn’t match any previous FBI hostage scenario. There was no door to kick down. No blueprint on file with county planners. No window to give a sniper a clear shot. Its dangers were a mystery. The bunker was a black box.

“Tell me what we need to do,” Sheriff Olson told the rescue-team commander.

“I don’t know,” the commander said. “I’ve never seen anything like this.”

Sheriff Olson realized he would be left to face the people of Dale County if the rescue failed. The sheriff met with Kirke Adams, the county district attorney, and they made a pact: “If this ends bad,” Mr. Adams said, “we’re in it together.”

Ethan, police learned, had had a rough upbringing. His mother struggled with drugs and alcohol, her family said, and she had lost custody of the boy. Authorities also found out Ethan could turn unruly if he missed taking a long list of behavioral drugs.

Mr. Dykes agreed to let deputies drop off medicines, coloring books, crayons and toys at the entrance to the bunker. When he retrieved the items through the partly opened hatch, deputies and FBI agents saw how he secured the bunker’s entry. Steel cables—the kind used to lock bicycles—were strung from eyebolts in the hatch to the rungs of the ladder below. Mr. Dykes loosened the cables to let in the deliveries.

Agents urged Mr. Dykes to accept a “throw phone,” a direct line strung between the bunker and negotiators. The weather was too foul to keep people posted outside, the agents said, and conversations through the PVC pipe were hard to understand. The phone would let them talk at any time.

Mr. Dykes agreed. He took the phone and duct-taped it to the bunker wall.

Lt. Rafferty and the lead FBI negotiator settled into the cab of a blue truck, parked on the dirt road, holding their end of the phone line. At first, the FBI man did most of the talking.

Mr. Dykes made his demands: He would swap Ethan for a female TV reporter who would join him in the bunker and broadcast his manifesto as he spoke. Once he delivered his message, he would put a plastic bag over his head and fill it with helium. The woman would hold his hand as he suffocated.

In the course of the day, FBI agents managed to slip a concealed camera into the bunker. The view was limited, but they could see Ethan, Mr. Dykes, a blue tarp that shielded a toilet bucket, and a three-level bunk bed.

At 3:30 p.m., the FBI negotiator put a female agent on the phone with Mr. Dykes, introducing her as a reporter from an Internet-based TV news program.

“How are you doing?” she asked.

Mr. Dykes sounded near tears. “I’ve seen better days,” he said. “This hasn’t been very easy on me, either.”

He warned it would take several days to explain his views on the air. They hung up without making any plans for a broadcast.

Just after 6 p.m., Mr. Dykes was back on the phone, furious. He had somehow figured out the reporter was a fake. The agents weren’t sure what tipped him off. His pistol was visible on the bunk. Agents could see a growth of white beard on his face. “It was all lies, wasn’t it?” he demanded.

Mr. Dykes cut off talks with the FBI. That forced the sheriff’s deputy, Lt. Rafferty, to the phone. Lt. Rafferty, 54 years old and solidly built, had worked a dozen years as a welder before going into law enforcement. He grew up in Illinois but had absorbed enough of an Alabama accent to pass for a local.

Colleagues described him as unflappable. He had never conducted a hostage negotiation, so he relied on advice drilled into him by his parents.

“If you keep your mouth shut and your ears open,” he liked to say, “it’s amazing what you’ll hear.”

Video: Dale County Sheriff Wally Olson and Houston County Deputy Sheriff Bill Rafferty describe the confusion that immediately followed the hostage-taking. (1:12)

DAY THREE

Ethan’s kidnapping was all people talked about in Midland City and neighboring towns. It seemed everybody had a rescue plan—relatives, neighbors and what FBI agents privately called “the Good Ideas Club” in Washington.

Authorities dismissed a proposal to pump sleeping gas into the bunker, recalling a botched 2002 Russian rescue in a Moscow theater that killed more than 100 innocents. Someone suggested delivering drugged food to the bunker, but there was too big a risk Ethan would eat some.

An Alabama militiaman, calling himself Col. Crusher, showed up in fatigues and a beret, promising he could storm the bunker and save the day. He was joined by a community-college security guard dressed as a Texas Ranger. Police sent them both packing.

Calls and emails poured into the sheriff’s office from people across the U.S. offering to take Ethan’s place. When news broke that Mr. Dykes had demanded a TV reporter, several volunteered. Authorities, however, didn’t want to give Mr. Dykes another hostage.

The pastor of Destiny Church opened its doors to police. Churches and restaurants delivered enough food to feed a law-enforcement contingent that reached 300. An Army surplus store provided ponchos. Sheriff Olson tapped a local RV dealer to loan vehicles to use as offices in the church parking lot.

FBI medical personnel plotted the fastest routes to local emergency rooms and warned doctors to prepare for the worst. The hostage-rescue team searched out area veterinarians, making sure they could treat a dog with a bullet wound.

Bomb technicians examined the many PVC pipes sprouting from the property. To their relief, they found no more explosives. Mr. Dykes appeared to use the pipes to support plants.

Agent Richardson, Sheriff Olson and the negotiators remained hopeful they could talk Mr. Dykes out of the bunker.

Lt. Rafferty spent eight or nine hours a day on the phone with him. Their topics spanned TV hosts Jerry Springer and Oprah Winfrey, trucking regulation, gay marriage, the plague of loose dogs, the idiots in the FBI and the long list of indignities Mr. Dykes had suffered at the hands of government.

Mr. Dykes lashed out if Lt. Rafferty interrupted. If the lieutenant fell silent, Mr. Dykes would ask: “Bill, are you listening?”

Inevitably, talk returned to the kidnapping. Lt. Rafferty suggested Mr. Dykes surrender and police could set up cameras to record his words as he emerged. But Mr. Dykes never altered his demands: the female reporter, a live broadcast, suicide by helium.

A break came from officers who rifled through Mr. Dykes’s trash and discovered receipts from Wal-Mart and Home Depot. Among the items purchased: shotgun shells and a small propane bottle, the type used to fuel camp stoves.

Mr. Dykes had threatened to blow something up if police assaulted the bunker. Inside the small space he shared with Ethan, the FBI realized, he had the makings of a second bomb.

DAY FOUR

As the standoff continued, reporters from around the world joined a media camp at a defunct gas station across the highway from Destiny Church.

The FBI knew Mr. Dykes had a working TV mounted on the bunker wall, and TV reporters were asked to keep images related to a possible rescue off the air—for instance, the arrival of a large supply of lumber.

Based on the neighbor’s description, the secret camera and glimpses caught during medicine deliveries, the FBI had an idea of what the bunker looked like inside. Using the lumber, Navy engineers called Seabees built in a matter of hours an aboveground mock-up to give the rescue team a place to rehearse.

If negotiations failed, FBI agents would have to surprise Mr. Dykes. To do that, they needed a fast way down the entry shaft Mr. Dykes called the “funnel of death.” The ladder was set at such an angle that anyone jumping down the narrow opening risked landing on the bottom rungs and breaking a leg.

Agents designed a crossbar to place across the bunker opening. They could hang from the bar and then drop, cutting in half the distance to the bottom. Agents practiced their entry over and over, timing each step.

Special Agent Molly Amman, the FBI’s lead profiler on the case, studied the video from the school bus and listened to hours of negotiations. She came to see Mr. Dykes, in the language of profilers, as an “injustice collector,” a person who stewed over perceived wrongs from years earlier.

Mr. Dykes also proved himself a “promise keeper,” someone who would make good on his threats. He said he would shoot Mr. Poland, and he did.

If he said he would kill Ethan, Agent Amman believed, that was exactly what would happen.

DAY FIVE

At 3 a.m., Saturday, two FBI agents in a black SUV picked up Mr. Dykes’s elder daughter, Cindy Dykes, in a small town in the Florida panhandle. They drove her to Alabama and checked her into the Holiday Inn Express under an assumed name. They said they might need her to talk to her father.

Ms. Dykes, age 36, hadn’t heard from him in a quarter of a century. She remembered his volatility, his racist streak and his taste for booze and guns.

Her mother, Nelda Lukers, had worked as an exotic dancer and cocktail waitress. Ms. Lukers grew bored in her first marriage and found Jim Dykes dangerous and exciting, with his bushy black hair, sprawling sideburns and fierce opinions. Sometimes he would sew the sequins on her dance costumes. Other times, he would beat her in a drunken rage, then blame her for it.

Ms. Lukers used to say she always loved Jim, but that if she had stuck with him, he would have killed her. They split when Ms. Dykes was 3 years old.

At first, Ms. Dykes lived with her mother. At age 10, she spent a year with her father in Texas. When the FBI came calling that Saturday morning, she said goodbye to her own children as if she weren’t coming home. Ms. Dykes pictured herself taking Ethan’s place in the bunker.

Video: Jim Dykes’s daughter Cindy Dykes learns about the kidnapping and recalls her father’s violent past. (1:42)

Meanwhile, 800 miles away, FBI explosives expert Kevin Finnerty bought several feet of PVC pipe at a Home Depot and swung by Wal-Mart for a half-dozen small propane bottles—items on the receipts found in Mr. Dykes’s trash.

At the FBI lab in Quantico, Va., Agent Finnerty and his team assembled six replicas of the bomb they believed Mr. Dykes kept in the bunker. They duct-taped a propane bottle to an 8-inch length of PVC pipe filled with a half pound of gunpowder. The agents figured Mr. Dykes planned to detonate his bomb by shooting an air-gun pellet into a shotgun-shell primer embedded in the pipe’s end cap.

The explosives team detonated their bombs in an open field, each one triggering a hailstorm of PVC shrapnel and a shower of orange flame. They concluded it would be tough for Mr. Dykes to detonate the bomb with an air rifle. A lucky shot, however, could kill everyone in the bunker.

FBI technicians in Quantico, Va., test a replica of the bomb that Mr. Dykes had in the bunker. Credit: FBI

Mr. Dykes’s mood had begun to swing from calm and determined to furious and threatening in conversations with Lt. Rafferty. He mulled over resentments at night and woke up ready to vent. Each time Mr. Dykes’s anger rose, Lt. Rafferty tried to ratchet it back, a task that grew more difficult.

All week, TV crews interviewed neighbors, including a woman who described Mr. Dykes as a “time bomb waiting to go off.” The criticism irritated Mr. Dykes, who watched on TV.

Desperate to ease Mr. Dykes’s anger, Sheriff Olson held a news conference to thank him “for taking care of our child.”

Just after 1 p.m., Mr. Dykes opened the hatch for a medicine delivery and spotted a SWAT officer’s rifle. The sight infuriated him. He climbed down the ladder and paced in the bunker, cradling his pistol. He wiped tears on his white T-shirt and called Lt. Rafferty in a rage. Ethan knows how to fire the air rifle and detonate the bomb, he said. Behind him, the boy watched a TV show.

“If I’m dead, the kid’s going to have access to this trigger,” Mr. Dykes said, leaning on the bunk bed. “If I fall dead and blood goes every-goddamn-where, he’s going to have access to that weapon, and he’s very likely going to get to it and pull that trigger before they will be able to come through that door.”

“We don’t want that to happen,” Lt. Rafferty said. “I don’t want you to do anything to tarnish your message.”

The lieutenant said the SWAT officer had been yanked from medicine-delivery duty. Mr. Dykes wasn’t appeased.

“That trigger-happy son of a bitch,” Mr. Dykes said. “He may think he’s Rambo, and he may think he’s going to be a hero if he does that, but he’s not going to be no goddamn hero when the world knows he’s responsible for killing this kid.”

Video: Jim Dykes breaks down while talking to Houston County Deputy Sheriff Bill Rafferty about Ethan’s safety. (1:45)

DAY SIX

On Sunday, Mr. Adams, the district attorney, broke his own rule and brought his cellphone to First United Methodist in Ozark, the church he had attended since he was a boy. He set the phone to vibrate and sat in his usual pew.

Heads swiveled when the phone buzzed five minutes into the service, and Mr. Adams slipped outside to take the call.

“We need you down here now,” Sheriff Olson said.

In the command-post vehicle at Destiny Church, Agent Richardson described to Mr. Adams how Mr. Dykes seemed near the end of his rope.

Earlier in the week Mr. Dykes had taken on an almost-grandfatherly role with Ethan, excusing himself from negotiations when Ethan needed attention. Now, he neglected the boy. At one point, Mr. Dykes stepped on Ethan’s toy car and the boy threw a tantrum that lasted an hour. Mr. Dykes ignored him.

Agent Richardson then asked the prosecutor: “If we go in there and have to shoot Dykes, we want to make sure you’re good with that decision.”

It was an awkward moment. The FBI wanted to know if the state would press charges against federal agents should Mr. Dykes be killed in the raid.

As district attorney, Mr. Adams had discretion to file charges or convene a grand jury, standard practice in a police shooting. Still, he thought the question unnecessary, given the situation, and would have laughed if he hadn’t been so intimidated by the FBI agents.

“Based on everything I know, and the urgency of these circumstances, I believe you’re justified if Mr. Dykes dies in this rescue attempt,” Mr. Adams said.

The FBI lawyer, Doug Astralaga, then asked: What if the boy dies?

The question surprised Mr. Adams. He hadn’t considered the state’s legal course if Ethan was killed in a failed rescue, and he paused to think.

“You’re backed into a corner,” he said, finally. “You have to try.”

On the video feed, the FBI watched Mr. Dykes rehearsing the steps to detonate the propane bomb.

Mr. Dykes set 5:30 p.m. the next day as the deadline for authorities to meet his demands. “I’m going to die in this hole,” he told Lt. Rafferty.

DAY SEVEN

On Monday morning, Agent Richardson, Sheriff Olson and the senior state police officer sat down for a conference call with FBI Director Robert Mueller. Mr. Mueller asked each man his thoughts.

They all agreed Mr. Dykes was leaving them no choice. “I don’t see this situation ending in a good way,” Sheriff Olson told the director.

Negotiations were over. Mr. Richardson issued what the FBI calls a “rolling green” order, which authorized Kevin Cornelius, the rescue-team commander, to make the final decision to storm the bunker.

Approval for the rescue carried conditions. Ethan had to be clear of the shaft when the team’s explosive charges blew open the bunker hatch. And Mr. Dykes had to be in the shaft at that moment.

FBI agents decided to play the trump card they held in reserve. Agents drove Mr. Dykes’s daughter, Cindy, from the Holiday Inn to join Lt. Rafferty in the blue truck parked on Private Road 1539. They told her she would talk with her father on a video call. An FBI agent had rehearsed with her all weekend in a room at Destiny Church, mimicking her father’s manic, confrontational conversations.

Even after the practice sessions, Ms. Dykes worried she might say the wrong thing and set him off.

She brought photos of her four children to show him, as well as a snapshot of her and her father lighting sparklers on a long-ago Fourth of July. She planned to urge him to surrender; at least she could visit him in prison. She wanted to say she loved him.

Her mother had died less than a month earlier, but the FBI urged her not to tell her father.

Mr. Dykes was excited at the prospect of speaking with his daughter and told Lt. Rafferty he wanted to change his shirt and brush his hair.

Just after 3 p.m., two officers carried a laptop computer to the bunker. “I’m going to need you guys to back away,” Mr. Dykes told them.

Inside the van, Ms. Dykes and Lt. Rafferty watched on their own screen as Mr. Dykes drew the laptop in through the hatch. He carried the computer with the camera aimed away from his body; the device caught a view of ladder rungs passing as he descended into the bunker.

“Hey, Bill,” he said to Lt. Rafferty.

“Your daughter Cynthia is here to talk to you,” the lieutenant replied.

“Oh, good,” Mr. Dykes said.

Ms. Dykes teared up when she heard his voice. She never got a chance to speak.

Jimmy Lee Dykes had reached the bunker floor when the FBI breaching team detonated explosive charges on the eye bolts that secured the cable locks to the hatch. The hatch lurched into the air and landed back in place. The rescue team, hiding behind Mr. Dykes’s van, ran to the bunker entrance.

In the command post, Agent Richardson watched the choreographed rescue unravel over the next nine seconds.

The explosives team yanked the heavy wooden hatch aside while the entry team’s point man, a Marine Corps Iraq veteran, waited at the base of the cinder-block staircase, holding the crossbar. He ran up to the entrance, settled the bar across the opening and swung down into the 12-foot-deep hole.

The point man came to a stop halfway down, his legs snagged in an unseen web. A second agent followed and stacked up on top of the point man’s head and shoulders; he tried to push the point man past the obstruction.

Mr. Dykes reached his pistol around the corner and blindly fired at the men stuck in the entry shaft.

The point man saw the pistol’s muzzle flash at point-blank range. Thoughts raced through his mind: I can’t shoot back or I might hit the boy. I just botched the rescue. This is going to hurt.

“He’s shooting at me,” the point man yelled to the men above.

The other agents hoisted out the point man. “Are you hit?” the team medic asked. Wired on adrenaline, the agent wasn’t sure. “You tell me,” he said.

The medic found no blood. The shots had angled inches past the agent and ripped into the wood panels lining the entry shaft.

In the bunker, Mr. Dykes yanked the cord strung through the PVC pipe, detonating the bomb by the gate. Shotgun pellets and PVC shards showered the property. The concussion rocked the agents at the bunker entrance. Smoke from the explosion raced back through the pipe and seeped into the bunker.

In the command post, Sheriff Olson quietly asked God to “wrap your arms” around Ethan and the rescue team. Agent Richardson felt a wave of nausea when he saw the point man emerge without Ethan. He turned to the rescue-team commander: “You gotta tell me the little guy’s OK.”

“I can’t,” the commander said.

Unsure why the agents hadn’t been able to get down the shaft, the rescue team brought over Ella, an attack dog, and tried to lower her into the bunker on a long leash.

The Czech German shepherd was trained to run into holes to disable suspects. But she panicked when she got stuck at the same obstacle that had blocked the point man’s descent.

When they pulled the dog away, the agents saw a net of steel cables that Mr. Dykes had strung between the ladder and the wall.

Breaching specialists used bolt cutters and shotguns to shear away the cables. As they worked, agents peppered the bunker with flash-bang grenades, loud nonlethal devices they hoped would disorient Mr. Dykes. The explosives generated another cloud of smoke underground.

“Guys, we gotta get back in the hole,” one agent said.

Four minutes had passed and the point man was desperate to reach Ethan. This time, he didn’t bother with the crossbar. He held his pistol in his right hand and leapt feet-first down the shaft as if jumping into a swimming pool. He thought he might get lucky and land on Mr. Dykes.

Instead, his right elbow slammed against the frame of the entry hole, tearing his pistol loose. The weapon landed under the ladder. The agent hit bottom hard and collapsed onto his seat, unarmed in the smoky darkness.

He lunged forward, hoping to grab Mr. Dykes, but came up empty. On a second lunge, he touched a child’s head. He pulled Ethan against the wall and wrapped himself around the boy, cradling Ethan’s head in his chest.

“You’re going to be OK, Ethan,” the agent said. “You’re going to be OK.”

A beat after the point man hit the ground, a second rescuer jumped into the hole. Another beat, another rescuer.

Three agents in three seconds landed in the darkened bunker. The last two men found Mr. Dykes and, during a struggle, they shot him a dozen times in the face, neck, torso and hand. Mr. Dykes, shoeless in a T-shirt and bluejeans, fell back, his body slumped under the bunks, his legs askew amid blood, bullet casings and crayons.

The agents handcuffed the corpse, just in case. Five minutes after the rescue began, they hoisted Ethan up the ladder to the medic.

“Where’s that man?” Ethan asked.

“Oh, Ethan, you’re not going to see him anymore,” the medic said. “He’s gone.”

Video: Sheriff Wally Olson, Lt. Bill Rafferty and Cindy Dykes reflect on the violent conclusion to the Midland City hostage crisis. (2:27)

CODA

Hundreds of people showed up for Charles Poland’s memorial service. “His life, lived for the purpose of loving and caring for people, culminated with the same purpose evident,” the bus driver’s family said in a tribute.

Alabama named the stretch of road that runs past Destiny Church the “Charles Poland Jr. Memorial Highway.” The county exchanged his school bus for a new one.

Tré Watts moved to North Carolina, where he finished high school and works stocking shelves at a Food Lion supermarket. The National Association for Pupil Transportation gave him an award for his coolheaded 911 call from the bus.

Tré Watts at home in Fayetteville, N.C., where he shares an apartment with his grandmother. Jeremy M. Lange for The Wall Street Journal

Brittin Norris, the emergency operator who handled Tre’s call, quit shortly afterward. The emotional stress of the job overwhelmed her. “You have to be a certain kind of person to turn off your heart,” she said.

The FBI honored Bill Rafferty with a Medal for Meritorious Achievement, the agency’s highest award for a non-agent. Lt. Rafferty wept when Ethan emerged from the bunker unharmed; he keeps a photo of the boy in his office.

It still stings that he wasn’t able to save Mr. Dykes, but, Lt. Rafferty said, “I’ve come to the conclusion that the Midland City crisis ended the only way Jimmy Lee Dykes would allow it to.”

Earlier this year, Lt. Rafferty talked a suicidal 18-year-old woman off a bridge.

Sheriff Wally Olson still can’t grasp the rage that drove Mr. Dykes. “You have to wonder what went wrong,” he said. “What makes someone sit there and go through the process of planning something like this?”

In 2014, he ran unopposed for a third term as sheriff of Dale County.

Ethan Gilman turned 6 soon after his rescue. FBI Agent Steve Richardson, Sheriff Olson, District Attorney Kirke Adams and other law-enforcement officers loaded a cart with toys at Target and delivered them to his birthday party.

Ethan’s teacher suspects his unstable background—moving from house to house, often separated from his mother—somehow helped him survive a week underground with Jim Dykes. Now in second grade, Ethan no longer speaks of the kidnapping.

The ordeal, however, may have left damage difficult to separate from that caused by a troubled childhood. Ethan’s self-control seemed to improve after his rescue. But his behavior has since taken a sharp turn for the worse. “It has been going downhill for a while,” said his half-brother, who served as his guardian.

Cindy Dykes called her children shortly after the raid. “They killed him,” she told them. “And they used me.”

She said later she understood that her father had left the FBI little choice.

Ms. Dykes didn’t have enough money to bury her father. She keeps his ashes in the bedroom closet of her mobile home.

Nobody heard the story Jimmy Lee Dykes wanted to tell.

Watch the documentary: Inside the Midland City Hostage Crisis. (16:30)

CREDITS

Story editors: Sam Enriquez, Matthew Rose

Visual editor: Madeline Farbman

Design director: Laura Holder

Lead design and development: Ana Asnes Becker

Executive video producer: Jill Kirschenbaum

Senior video producer: Gabe Johnson

Illustrations: Christopher Kaeser

Additional development: Chris Canipe, Hani Lim, Tyler Paige

Photo editor: Sarah Morse

ENDNOTES

Introduction

Information about Jimmy Lee Dykes’s past, including his record of criminal charges, comes from the Dale County Sheriff’s Office; military records in the National Archives; interviews with his daughter, Cindy Dykes; and body-camera video footage of Mr. Dykes in a conversation with Dale County Sheriff’s Deputy Mason Bynum on Nov. 16, 2011.

Information about Mr. Dykes’s behavior on his property and the trip to Wal-Mart comes from an interview with Michael Creel Jr., his neighbor.

Details about the pecan incident come from the body-camera footage of Mr. Dykes talking with Deputy Bynum in 2011.

Information about construction of the bunker and Mr. Dykes’s apparent hope that it would be soundproof come from Mr. Creel.

Details of the speed-bump incident come from interviews with Dale County Sheriff Wally Olson, Dale County District Attorney Kirke Adams and Mr. Creel.

Quotes of conversations between Mr. Dykes and bus driver Chuck Poland come from security-camera footage from Dale County school bus 04-2 that was recorded on Jan. 28, 2013. The footage also contains Mr. Poland’s comment about Mr. Dykes’s kindness.

Details about Mr. Poland come from his son, Aaron Poland.

Day One

Details about the gifts that Mr. Poland left for Mr. Dykes are contained in a handwritten note from Mr. Poland to Mr. Dykes. Further confirmation comes from Mr. Creel.

The contents of Mr. Dykes’s wallet were examined by The Wall Street Journal.

Details about how Mr. Dykes boarded the bus with a bag of broccoli come from security-camera footage recorded aboard Dale County school bus 04-2 on Jan. 29, 2013, and from law-enforcement crime-scene photographs.

Details about Mr. Dykes’s appearance come from Tré Watts, as well as police crime-scene photographs. Sheriff Olson identified Mr. Dykes’s pistol as a Ruger.

Mr. Dykes’s written demands are contained in a copy of his letter, viewed by The Wall Street Journal. The zip-tie is visible in security-camera footage from the bus.

Dialogue between Messrs. Dykes and Poland, and words that Mr. Dykes told the children, come from bus security-camera footage.

Quotations from 911 calls placed by Mr. Watts and Mr. Dykes come from audio recordings by Ozark-Dale County E-911 on Jan. 29, 2013.

Information about Ethan Gilman’s behavioral issues come from his half-brother, Camren Kirkland, as well as Shelly Linderman, executive director of Wiregrass Angel House in Dothan, Ala., Suzanne Dasinger, his teacher at Midland City Elementary School, and federal and local law-enforcement officials.

Mr. Watts reported that Mr. Poland never left his seat.

Details of Mr. Poland’s death come from bus security-camera video and law-enforcement crime-scene photographs.

Mr. Creel saw Mr. Dykes hoisting Ethan onto his shoulder and carrying him toward the bunker.

Details of the PVC communication pipe and the layout of Mr. Dykes’s property come from law-enforcement crime-scene and aerial photographs, as well as from FBI agents.

Quotations from Deputy Bill Rafferty’s initial conversation with Mr. Dykes through the PVC pipe come from Lt. Rafferty, who is now a captain in the Houston County Sheriff’s Office.

The timing of the arrival of the FBI negotiator comes from an internal law-enforcement presentation by the Dale County Sheriff’s Office.

Details of the bunker’s construction and dimensions come from Mr. Creel, Sheriff Olson and Kevin Cornelius, who commanded the FBI Hostage Rescue Team in Midland City and has since retired.

Details about the discovery of the bomb in the PVC pipe come from FBI Supervisory Special Agent Mike Harris and an FBI X-ray image.

The FBI’s concern that the Dykes property might prove to be a minefield comes from interviews with Agent Harris and FBI Assistant Director Steve Richardson, who at the time was the FBI’s on-scene commander in Midland City. Other details come from law-enforcement aerial photographs of the Dykes property.

Day Two

Details of the FBI’s use of a microphone and speaker at the PVC pipe come from interviews with Sheriff Olson, Lt. Rafferty and FBI agents.

Sheriff Olson shared his thoughts about learning that Mr. Dykes had set an improvised explosive device. Sheriff Olson also described the variety of crimes he has handled on the job. The Wall Street Journal witnessed his interactions with county residents.

Information about the FBI team’s arrival in the 727 comes from FBI profiler Molly Amman.

Agent Richardson and Sheriff Olson confirmed the details of their conversation about the Hostage Rescue Team’s “sharp elbows.”

Sheriff Olson recalled quotes from his conversation with the rescue-team commander, Agent Cornelius. Agent Cornelius described the complexity of the situation for would-be rescuers.

District Attorney Adams and Sheriff Olson described their conversation about a possible bad outcome of the rescue attempt.

The substance-abuse problems of Ethan’s mother were described by her father, her son Mr. Kirkland, Sheriff Olson, Lt. Rafferty, District Attorney Adams and Agent Richardson. The Wall Street Journal was unable to locate the mother to seek her comment.

The description of the hatch comes from FBI agents and crime-scene photographs.

Information about the throw-phone comes from Agent Richardson.

Lt. Rafferty and Sheriff Olson, as well as the FBI, confirmed details of Mr. Dykes’s demands.

The Wall Street Journal viewed footage from the camera the FBI concealed inside the bunker. That footage provided dialogue between Lt. Rafferty and Mr. Dykes, dialogue between Mr. Dykes and the female FBI agent posing as a TV reporter, details of Mr. Dykes’s behavior inside the bunker, and images of its physical layout up until the rescue attempt.

Day Three

Information about Col. Crusher and the security guard comes from Sheriff Olson and Agent Richardson.

The Dale County Sheriff’s Office had three operators on duty fielding calls and emails from people who had suggestions about how to rescue Ethan or volunteered to take his place. Agent Richardson said the agency thought it too risky to give Mr. Dykes a second hostage.

Details about the rescue team’s search for emergency rooms and veterinarians come from a presentation by the team’s medic in 2014.

Agent Richardson provided information about the effort to ensure there were no further hidden bombs on the property. The Wall Street Journal visited the site and saw that the pipes supported plants.

Lt. Rafferty described his long conversations with Mr. Dykes. Video footage from the concealed FBI camera provided further examples.

Details about the discovery of receipts in Mr. Dykes’s trash come from the FBI medic, Sheriff Olson and Agents Richardson, Cornelius and Harris.

Day Four

Details about law-enforcement’s handling of the media come from Sheriff Olson and Paul Bresson, unit chief, FBI National Press Office.

Information about construction of the mock bunker comes from Sheriff Olson and Agents Cornelius and Bresson.

Information about the rescue team’s concern about the angle of the entry ladder comes from Agent Cornelius and the FBI medic.

Details of the FBI’s use of the cross-bar come from Agents Cornelius and Richardson, as well as the rescue-team medic.

Agent Amman described her evolving view of Mr. Dykes.

Day Five

Details about Cindy Dykes’s arrival in Alabama, as well as her upbringing and memories of her parents, come from Ms. Dykes and family photos.

Information about testing replica bombs comes from FBI Agent Kevin Finnerty and Sheriff Olson, as well as from FBI video and photographs of the testing.

Agent Richardson and Sheriff Olson described the concern about a possible cave-in.

Details of Mr. Dykes’s mood swings come from Lt. Rafferty and Agent Richardson. Lt. Rafferty described Mr. Dykes’s irritation with the comments his neighbors made on television.

Agent Bresson and Sheriff Olson described their motivation for publicly thanking Mr. Dykes for caring for Ethan. News footage at the time showed the sheriff giving his statement.

Physical details and dialogue illustrating Mr. Dykes’s reaction to the SWAT officer come from video footage from the FBI’s hidden camera inside the bunker.

Day Six

Mr. Adams described his experience in church that day. He and Sheriff Olson confirmed the content of the phone call.

Lt. Rafferty and Agent Harris provided details of Mr. Dykes’s treatment of Ethan.

Information about the conversation over possible state investigation or prosecution of FBI agents comes from Mr. Adams, FBI attorney Doug Astralaga and Agent Richardson. Mr. Adams described his own feelings about the incident.

Agent Harris described FBI agents watching Mr. Dykes rehearse with the bomb.

Agents Amman and Richardson described the profilers’ conclusion that the situation was likely to end in murder-suicide.

Information about Mr. Dykes’s deadline comes from Lt. Rafferty, Sheriff Olson and Agent Richardson. Mr. Dykes’s quotation about dying in the bunker comes from Lt. Rafferty.

Day Seven

Details of the conference call with FBI Director Robert Mueller come from Agent Richardson and Sheriff Olson.

Agents Cornelius and Richardson described the “rolling green” order.

Ms. Dykes described the rehearsals, as well as the scene inside the negotiation vehicle. She also detailed her expectations for the conversation with her father.

Information about Mr. Dykes’s concern about his appearance when talking to his daughter comes from Ms. Dykes and Lt. Rafferty.

Details about delivery of the laptop and the initial conversation between Mr. Dykes and Lt. Rafferty come variously from Ms. Dykes, Lt. Rafferty and Agent Richardson. The timing comes from an FBI email sent by Agent Melissa Pressley on Feb. 4, 2013, to inform law enforcement personnel of the end of the standoff.

The description of the way the breaching team blew the hatch comes from aerial footage from an FBI drone. Time stamps on the drone footage provide the second-by-second chronology of the rescue attempt.

The FBI entry team’s point man described his thoughts and words in written responses to questions from The Wall Street Journal. He also described the rescuers’ positions and actions during the first and second entry attempts. Where possible, his account was confirmed and elaborated upon by information from FBI drone footage, crime-scene photographs, the rescue-team medic, an interview with and written answers from Agent Cornelius, and reports the FBI provided to other government officials.

Sheriff Olson and the FBI point man described the results of the detonation of the PVC pipe bomb. FBI crime-scene photographs showed the dispersal of the shrapnel.

Sheriff Olson and Agents Richardson and Cornelius described the scene inside the command post.

The FBI described how the dog was lowered into the bunker. The dog’s reaction was provided by the rescue-team medic and Agent Richardson.

Agent Cornelius described the use of bolt cutters and a shotgun to clear the obstacles in the entry shaft.

The rescue team’s use of flash-bang grenades was visible in the FBI drone footage and the agency’s crime-scene photos of the aftermath in the bunker. Agent Cornelius also described their use, and recalled hearing the rescue-team agent urge his comrades to “get back in the hole.”

Details of Mr. Dykes’s wounds come from the autopsy of Jimmy Lee Dykes, Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences, and FBI crime-scene photographs. FBI photographs show Mr. Dykes’s handcuffed corpse.

The rescue-team medic reported the conversation he had with Ethan immediately after the boy left the bunker.

Coda

Dale County School Superintendent Donny Bynum described what happened to Mr. Poland’s bus.

Brittin Norris described her reasons for quitting her job as a 911 operator.

Information about Ethan’s continuing behavioral issues and legal status came variously from Mr. Kirkland, Ms. Linderman and the boy’s former teacher, Ms. Dasinger.

Ms. Dykes described her call to her children after the raid, as well as her feelings about the FBI’s tactics. She showed her father’s ashes to The Wall Street Journal.