Nine die in US gun rampage

A driver caught stealing beer from his warehouse agreed to resign then as “cold as ice” went on a shooting rampage, killing eight people and wounding two before committing suicide.

Omar Thornton, 34, pulled out a handgun after a disciplinary hearing in which he had been offered the chance to resign or be sacked from his firm in Manchester, Connecticut, yesterday.

It was America’s deadliest shooting since 13 people were killed at Fort Hood, Texas, in November.

A military psychiatrist is charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted premeditated murder in that case.

At the disciplinary hearing, Thornton was shown video evidence of the thefts and he calmly agreed to leave, company vice president Steve Hollander said.

“Then he went out on this rampage,” Mr Hollander said. “He was cool and calm. He didn’t yell. He was cold as ice.

“He didn’t protest when we were meeting with him to show him the video of him stealing. He didn’t contest it. He didn’t complain. He didn’t argue. He didn’t admit or deny anything. He just agreed to resign. And then he just unexplainably pulled out his gun and started blasting.”

Mr Hollander said he thought Thornton had guns stashed in his lunch box. The executive said two people standing near him were shot in the head and killed, but he was only grazed in the jaw and the arm.

“He shot at me twice and hit me a couple times. By just the grace of God, I don’t know how he missed me,” he said.

About 50 to 70 people were in the Hartford Distributors warehouse about 10 miles east of Hartford during a shift change when the gunman opened fire, said Brett Hollander, Steve Hollander’s cousin and a member of the family that owns the distributorship.

“I was on the phone with 911 (police dispatchers) and then I saw him running outside of my office window, shooting his gun, carrying his lunch box, which must have had his weapons in it,” Steve Hollander said.

“It doesn’t seem real to me now, it seems like I’m watching a movie.”

The shooting was over in a matter of minutes. The victims were found all over the complex, and authorities said they did not know if Thornton fired randomly or targeted specific co-workers.

After shooting his co-workers, Thornton called his mother, said Joanne Hannah, the mother of Thornton’s girlfriend.

“He wanted to say goodbye and that he loved everybody,” she said.

Thornton was alive when police arrived but killed himself before officers got to him, Manchester police chief Marc Montminy said.

A police sharpshooter had approval to fire on Thornton when he killed himself, an official with knowledge of the scene said.

State police found weapons in the suspect’s car, Mr Montminy said, without providing details.

Steve Hollander said Thornton killed “many good people for absolutely no reason at all, people who’ve never said an unkind word to him. ... He was just shooting at anyone that was near him and just cruelty beyond cruelty”.

Ms Hannah said her daughter Kristi had dated Thornton for the past eight years. Kristi Hannah did not return calls for comment.

“Everybody’s got a breaking point,” Joanne Hannah said.

Thornton, who was black, had complained of racial harassment and said he found a picture of a noose and a racial epithet written on a bathroom wall, Ms Hannah said. Her daughter told her that Thornton’s supervisors told him they would talk to his co-workers.

Brett Hollander said: “I can assure you there has never been any racial discrimination at our company.” A union official said Thornton had not filed a complaint of racism with the union or any government agency.

“This is a disgruntled employee who shot a bunch of people,” Teamsters official Christopher Roos said.

Among the dead was Bryan Cirigliano, 51, president of Teamsters 1035, according to the union, who had been Thornton’s representative at yesterday’s disciplinary hearing, the union said.