Gunman, hostages dead at home for veterans
A gunman and three hostages are dead after a shooting and standoff yesterday at a veterans home in California, the Associated Press reported, citing an unnamed US official.
A spokesman for the California Highway Patrol’s Golden Gate Division declined to immediately give details about the situation.
Authorities said they know who the gunman is but didn’t reveal his identity or know the motive for the attack at the state-run Veterans Home of CaliforniaYountville, in one of Napa Valley’s most upscale towns in the heart of wine country.
A sheriff’s deputy responding to an emergency call shortly after 10am local time got into a shootout with the gunman, but the officer was not injured.
‘‘We are approaching this as an active-shooter situation,’’ Napa County Sheriff John Robertson told reporters.
‘‘There was an exchange of gunfire by both our deputy and the suspect. There were many bullets fired.’’
Larry Kamer said that his wife, Devereaux Smith, was at a morning staff party and told him by phone that the gunman had entered the room quietly, letting some people leave while taking others hostage.
Smith, a fundraiser for the nonprofit Pathway Home, was still inside the facility’s dining hall and was not allowed to leave, he said.
The Pathway Home, a privately run program on the grounds of the veterans home, treats veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars with posttraumatic stress disorder.
The three hostages were Pathway House employees, California Highway Patrol Assistant Chief Chris Childs said. The gunman, who had a rifle, was confined to one room and authorities were trying to reach him on his cellphone and facility landlines as hostage negotiators stood by, he said.
Police evacuated the property and closed off nearby roads. An armoured police vehicle, ambulances and several fire trucks were at the facility, which houses about 1000 residents.
Army veteran and resident Bob Sloan, 73, was working at the home’s TV station when a coworker came in and said he had heard four gunshots coming from the Pathway House.
Sloan sent alerts for residents to stay put.
‘‘People are starting to get concerned because it’s been going on for so long,’’ he told AP by phone from inside the lockdown.
Except for helicopters buzzing overhead, the home was eerily quiet, Sloan said, adding that he could see police with ‘‘long-barrel assault-type weapons’’ crouching around the building, some taking cover behind trees.
Jan Thornton of Vallejo, California, was among hundreds of relatives worried about how their loved ones were coping with the lockdown.
Thornton said her 96-year-old father, a World War II fighter pilot, was inside a hospital wing and that she had reached one of his friends who said he was safe.
Still, she worried about the stress of the lockdown, considering her father’s age and that he has PTSD and some dementia.
Thornton said her ‘‘heart just bleeds for the people that are being held hostage.’’
A group of about 80 students who were on the home’s grounds were safely evacuated after being locked down, the sheriff said. The teens from Justin-Siena High School were at a theatre rehearsing a play.
‘‘They were a distance away from the shooting situation,’’ Robertson said.
Some of the children were driven away on school buses and others in cars.
Sasha Craig spotted a car carrying her 15- and 17-year-old children and ran toward it blowing kisses.
‘‘There are my kids,’’ she said. Like many parents, she was texting with her children inside and said the teenagers were telling their parents to ‘‘chill.’’
The state Veterans Affairs department says the home that opened in 1984 is the nation’s largest veterans home, with about 1000 elderly and disabled residents.
Yountville is a small town that’s home to wineries such as Domaine Chandon, which is less than 800m from the veterans facility.
There was an exchange of gunfire by both our deputy and the suspect. There were many bullets fired. Napa County Sheriff John Robertson
AP