Gunman kills five at US newspaper base
ANNAPOLIS, Maryland: A man who had a longrunning feud with an Annapolis newspaper yesterday blasted his way through its newsroom with a shotgun, killing at least five people in one of the deadliest attacks recorded on a United States media outlet, authorities said last night.
The suspect fired through a glass door, looked for victims then sprayed the newsroom of the Capital Gazette newspaper group in Annapolis with gunfire, police and a witness said.
Acting police chief of the Anne Arundel County Police Department William Krampf told a news conference Capital Gazette assistant editor Rob Hiaasen (59) was among the victims.
Wendy Winters (65), Rebecca Smith (34), Gerald Fischman (61), and John McNamara were also killed, he said. Smith was a sales assistant and the others were journalists.
The suspect is Jarrod Ramos (38), of Laurel, the Capital Gazette and Baltimore Sun
reported, citing law enforcement.
In 2012, Ramos brought a defamation lawsuit against Eric Hartley, formerly a staff writer and columnist with the Capital Gazette, and Thomas Marquardt, then editor and publisher of the Capital Gazette,
according to a court filing.
In 2015, Maryland’s secondhighest court upheld a ruling in favour of the Capital Gazette
and a former reporter who Ramos accused of defamation.
According to a legal document, the article contended that Ramos had harassed a woman on Facebook and that he had pleaded guilty to criminal harassment. The court agreed the contents of the article were accurate and based on public records, the document showed.
Ramos said on Twitter he had set up an account to defend himself, and wrote in his bio that he was suing people in Anne Arundel County and ‘‘making corpses of corrupt careers and corporate entities’’.
Phil Davis, a Capital Gazette crime reporter, said he was hiding under his desk along with other newspaper employees when the shooter stopped firing, the Capital Gazette reported on its website.
The newsroom looked ‘‘like a war zone’’, he told the Baltimore Sun, adding, ‘‘I don’t know why he stopped.’’
Police officers in the Maryland capital of Annapolis responded within a minute to a 911 call about a shooting in progress and apprehended the suspect who was hiding under a desk, authorities said.
Acting police chief Krampf said: ‘‘This was a targeted attack on the Capital Gazette.’’ Police said they recovered what they thought might have been explosive devices but Krampf realised Ramos had smoke grenades. — Reuters
❛ Newsroom looked
like a war zone