Tag Archives: shooter

Lockdown lifted at Alabama base after false reports of shooter

(Reuters) – A lockdown at a U.S. Army base in northern Alabama on Tuesday was lifted after two telephone calls reporting an active shooter at the sprawling facility near Huntsville turned out to be false.

No threat was found and an investigation is under way to determine who made the calls from within a building where the shooter was reported to have been, Colonel Thomas Holliday, commander of the Redstone Arsenal, said at a press conference.

“We have no evidence of shots actually (being) fired,” Holliday said.

One of the calls to 911 emergency dispatchers said gun shots had been heard, and another said a gun had been seen. Neither of those were credible, Holliday said.

There were no casualties, and no one was arrested, Holliday said. There were no visitors on that part of the base on Tuesday, he added.

The base is home to military units including the U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command and elements of the Defense Intelligence Agency and the Missile Defense Agency. It also hosts the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Marshall Space Flight Center, where rocket research and testing is conducted.

A total of about 43,000 military, NASA and civilian personnel work at Redstone Arsenal.

Holliday said the response of base personnel was appropriate, given that every U.S. military base has to be on high alert for potential active shooters and other acts of violence.

It took hours to ensure that everyone was safe in the 1.5-million-square-foot (457,200-square-meter) Sparkman Center complex where the shooter was reported.

A full base lockdown lasted for about two-and-a-half hours, and some buildings were shut for four-and-a-half hours, Holliday said.

A drill to handle a situation similar to the one reported on Tuesday was to occur later this week, but was canceled after this incident, Holliday said.

(Reporting by Bernie Woodall in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. and Gina Cherelus in New York; Additional reporting by Timothy Mclaughlin in Chicago; Editing by Tom Brown and Dan Grebler)

Two dead, including suspect in Dallas-area college shooting -police

AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) – A gunman on Wednesday shot and killed a woman on a college campus in the Dallas area, before committing suicide, police said, two days after a deadly stabbing at another college in Texas.

Adrian Victor Torres, 21, shot and killed Janeera Nickol Gonzalez, 20, in a common study area at North Lake College in Irving, before taking his own life in a locker room shower in a nearby building, the Irving Police Department said.

“It is unclear at this time if there was a prior connection between the victim and suspect,” it said in a statement.

Local news showed video footage of students running out of school buildings, located about 10 miles (16 km) west of downtown Dallas, at about 11:30 a.m., as police swarmed the campus.

Gonzalez’s mother Lucia told an ABC affiliate that Torres “had been stalking her for quite a while but she didn’t make anything of it.”

The family told the WFAA that the two never dated and were not friends. Gonzalez was studying kinesiology and planned to graduate in a few weeks.

“There is no justice for my daughter,” Gonzalez said.

College officials announced the school would be closed for the rest of the week.

On Monday, a man enrolled at the University of Texas went on a stabbing spree with a large hunting knife at the school’s Austin campus about 200 miles (320 km) south of Irving, killing one student and wounding three, police said.

(Reporting by Jon Herskovitz in Austin, Texas, and Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles; , Additional reporting and writing by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Clarence Fernandez)

Gunman targeting white men kills three in Fresno, California

A road is blocked by police tape after a multiple victim shooting incident in downtown Fresno, California, U.S. April 18, 2017. Fresno County Sheriff/Handout via REUTERS

By Dan Whitcomb

(Reuters) – A gunman who went by the nickname Black Jesus killed three white men in downtown Fresno, California, on Tuesday, and fired at another before he was taken into custody while shouting “Allahu Akhbar,” police said.

The suspect, 39-year-old Kori Ali Muhammad, was also wanted in connection with the fatal shooting last week of an unarmed security guard at a Motel 6 in Fresno, Police Chief Jerry Dyer told reporters at a press conference.

Dyer said Muhammad fired at least 16 rounds from a large-caliber handgun in less than a minute at four downtown Fresno locations at about 10:45 a.m. local time before he was spotted running through the streets by a police officer.

“Immediately upon the individual seeing the officer he literally dove onto the ground and was taken into custody and as he was taken into custody he yelled out ‘Allahu Akhbar,'” Dyer said. The term means “God is great” in Arabic.

“He does not like white people,” Dyer said, citing the suspect’s statements after being arrested and his Facebook postings. The chief said Muhammad, who is African American, used the nickname Black Jesus.

All four of the men killed on Tuesday were white, as was the security guard and the other man Mohammad shot at but missed.

Dyer said it was too early to rule out terrorism and that his department had contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigation to investigate, but portrayed the incident as “a random act of violence.”

“These individuals who were chosen today did not do anything to deserve what they got,” he said. “These were unprovoked attacks by an individual who was intent on carrying out homicides today, and he did that.”

Dyer said Muhammad had been identified quickly as the prime suspect in the Motel 6 shooting on April 13 and that police had been urgently seeking him across the Fresno area since then.

Fresno is an agricultural hub in California’s central valley, about 170 miles southeast of San Francisco.

Muhammad has a criminal history that includes weapons and drug charges and had spent time in state prison, Dyer said.

County government buildings were placed on lockdown during the shooting spree and residents were urged to shelter in place.

Local television images showed what appeared to be a body covered in a yellow tarp in a street near where police tape marked off several crime scenes.

(Reporting by Dan Whitcomb and Steve Gorman; Editing by Richard Chang)

Baton Rouge shooter was ex-marine who denied ties to any group

A police officer wears a black band of mourning over his shield while attending a vigil after a fatal shooting of Baton Rouge policemen, at Saint John the Baptist Church in Zachary

By Mark Hosenball and Kevin Murphy

WASHINGTON/KANSAS CITY, Mo. (Reuters) – The gunman who killed three police officers in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, on Sunday was a former U.S. Marine sergeant who served in Iraq and made the dean’s list in college, government officials with knowledge of the case said.

The suspect, Gavin Eugene Long, 29, who also wounded three other officers, was from Kansas City, Missouri, a source familiar with the investigation told Reuters. He was divorced and living in a working-class neighborhood, and Missouri records show he had no criminal history.

It was not immediately clear how Long, who was black, ended up in Baton Rouge, where police killed him in a shootout on his 29th birthday, according to media reports. The city has become a flashpoint for protests after police shot and killed Alton Sterling, a black man, outside a convenience store there on July 5.

A website, social media accounts and YouTube videos that appear tied to Long include complaints about police abuse of African-Americans and indicate he recently joined demonstrations in Dallas, where a black former U.S. Army reservist killed five officers two days after Sterling’s death.

In a YouTube video, Long praised the killing of the Dallas officers and said, “It’s justice.” He also posted a separate video on July 8, in which he described himself as a former Christian, former member of the Nation of Islam and then repeatedly stated he was now not affiliated with any group.

“They’ll try to put you with ISIS or some other terrorist group,” he said. “No. I’m affiliated with the spirit of justice. Nothing else.”

A website named “convoswithcosmo” that features self-help, health and relationship advice was owned by a Gavin Long at a Kansas City address, according to online records. As of Sunday night, police in Kansas City had cordoned off the block where that address is located. That address also appears in local court records for a Gavin Long in two separate civil cases.

In a YouTube video posted on July 10, the host of “Convos with Cosmo” says he is in Dallas and had gone to the city to join protests there. The man says that African-Americans are oppressed and questions why white American revolutionaries are praised for fighting their oppressors but African ones are not.

Later in the video, he suggests that only violence and financial pressure will cause change.

“We know what it’s going to take. It’s only fighting back or money. That’s all they care about,” he says to the camera. “Revenue and blood, revenue and blood, revenue and blood. Nothing else.”

A government source said federal officials were reviewing the web postings but could not definitively link them to Long.

DECORATED MILITARY CAREER

Long was affiliated with the anti-government New Freedom Group, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing a person briefed on the investigation. A spokeswoman for the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks extremist groups, said she had no information about such a group.

Reuters was not able to confirm the existence of the New Freedom Group.

Records provided by the U.S. Marines show Long received a number of awards during his five years in the military, including a good conduct medal.

He served in the Marines from August 2005 to August 2010 as a data network specialist and rose to the rank of sergeant, according to Yvonne Carlock, deputy public affairs officer for the Marines. Long was deployed to Iraq from June 2008 to January 2009.

CBS News reported that he left the Marines with an honorable discharge, but Carlock would not confirm that detail.

Public records show Long had lived in Kansas City and Grandview, Missouri, as well as San Diego and Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

He divorced his wife in 2011, with no children at the time, according to Missouri court records. A home that appears to be the last-known address for his ex-wife was vacant on Sunday.

No relatives for Long could be reached by telephone.

Long was a defendant in a case involving delinquent city taxes that was filed in March and dismissed in June, according to court records.

He attended the University of Alabama for one semester in spring 2012 and made the dean’s list for academic achievement, said university spokeswoman Monica Watts.

“The university police had no interaction with him while he was a student,” she said in an email.

(Additional reporting by David Rohde, Ian Simpson and Brendan O’Brien; Additional reporting and writing by Colleen Jenkins; Editing by Peter Cooney and Clarence Fernandez)

Truck attacker kills dozens in Nice, driver shot dead

An injured individual is seen on the ground after at least 30 people were killed in Nice, France, when a truck ran into a crowd celebrating the Bastille Day national holiday July 14, 2016.

By Michel Rose

PARIS (Reuters) – At least 30 people were killed and 100 injured in the French Riviera city of Nice late on Thursday when a truck ploughed into crowds watching a fireworks display on France’s Bastille Day national holiday in a criminal attack, a local official said.

The driver, who drove at high speed for over 100 meters (yards) along the famed Promenade des Anglais seafront before hitting the mass of spectators, was shot dead, sub-prefect Sebastien Humbert told France Infos radio.

Humbert described it as a clear criminal attack, although the driver was not yet identified. Residents of the Mediterranean city close to the Italian border were advised to stay indoors. There was no sign of any other attack.

Almost exactly eight months ago Islamic State militants killed 130 people in Paris. On Sunday, France had breathed a sigh of relief as the month-long Euro 2016 soccer tournament ended without a feared attack.

“Dear Nicois,” local mayor Christian Estrosi tweeted, “The driver of a truck appears to have killed dozens of people. Stay at home for the time being. More news to follow.”

Regional newspaper Nice Matin quoted its reporter at the scene saying there were many injured people and blood on the street. It published a photograph of a damaged, long-distance delivery truck, which it said was riddled with bullets and images of emergency services treating the injured.

Damien Allemand, the paper’s correspondent, was quoted as saying: “People are running. It’s panic. He rode up onto the Prom and piled into the crowd … There are people covered in blood. There must be many injured.”

Social media carried images of people lying apparently lifeless in pools of blood.

U.S. government agencies have received constant reports of Islamic State threats to attack France and those threats are regarded as current, a U.S. security official said. However, two U.S. officials said they had no information at this point about whether militants were involved in the Nice incident.

CNN said it has spoken to a witness, identified as an American pilot, who saw the truck ramming the crowd. The witness said the driver mowed people down, accelerating as he hit them. The witness said there was only one person in the truck.

Local mayor Estrosi has warned in the past of the risk of Islamist attacks in the region, following Islamic State bloodshed in Paris and Brussels over the past 18 months.

French President Francois Hollande, who was in the south of France at the time, had hours earlier said a state of emergency put in place after the Paris attacks in November would not be extended when it was due to expire on July 26.

“We can’t extend the state of emergency indefinitely, it would make no sense. That would mean we’re no longer a republic with the rule of law applied in all circumstances,” Hollande told journalists in a traditional Bastille Day interview.

(Writing by Alastair Macdonald; Editing by James Dalgleish)

Police shoot dead masked man who took hostages in German cinema

German special police during hostage situation

By Ralf Banser

VIERNHEIM, Germany (Reuters) – A masked man took hostages at a cinema in western Germany on Thursday before police stormed the complex and shot him dead, police said.

No other people were injured, a police spokesman said.

The attacker, who carried a rifle or “long gun”, acted alone and appeared to have been a “disturbed man”, the interior minister of Hesse state, Peter Beuth, told the regional parliament.

Police had not identified the man or established his motive, spokesman Bernd Hochstaedter said, adding that nothing immediately pointed to him having a militant background.

German television showed pictures of heavily-armed police, wearing helmets and body armor, storming the Kinopolis complex in Viernheim, south of Frankfurt, and a couple fleeing the building.

Cinema employee Guri Blakaj told Reuters the gunman, who appeared to be aged between 18 and 25 and was about 1.7 meters tall, entered the cinema at around 3 p.m. and told workers to get into an office.

He then went into a cinema theater. Blakaj, who said there were about six workers and 30 cinemagoers in the building, then heard shots fired.

Police special forces stormed the building and shot him.

There was still a heavy police presence at the scene into the late afternoon, and a helicopter circled overhead.

(Additional reporting by Madeline Chambers, Michael Nienaber and Sabine Siebold; Editing by Andrew Roche)

At least two people killed at Lackland Air Force Base

Bexar County Sheriff photo of deputies inside Lackland Air Force Base

By Jim Forsyth

SAN ANTONIO (Reuters) – Two people were killed in an apparent murder-suicide at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio on Friday that triggered a lockdown at the facility, the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office said.

“It’s over,” Bexar County Sheriff’s office spokesman James Keith said, adding that deputies were still on the scene.

The commanding officer of the 331st K-9 Training Squadron at the base was shot by an airman, according to the Air Force Times, an independent news outlet, citing on internal Pentagon communications. Neither person was immediately identified.

The incident took place at the Medina annex at the facility, where dog training takes place.

Keith said the sheriff’s office did not believe there were other victims but deputies were searching buildings “out of an abundance of caution.”

The sheriff’s office had responded to reports of a shooter at the base.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation said it had been called to assist.

Parts of the base were locked down as a result of the incident, including nearby schools, the sheriff’s office said.

Authorities also ordered people at a nearby industrial complex to stay in their buildings.

(Reporting by Jon Herskovitz and Jim Forsyth; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Jeffrey Benkoe)