4 dead after Md. warehouse shooting
ABERDEEN, Md. — Workers say they endured horrifying moments of wild gunfire and terror as a woman working a temporary job at a drugstore warehouse in Maryland fired on colleagues with a handgun, killing three people before fatally shooting herself.
The shooting, which authorities said was touched off when the worker got into an argument Thursday morning, sent survivors screaming and running in all directions from the Rite Aid distribution center in northeastern Maryland. Others nearby helped the wounded and one person tied blood-soaked jeans around an injured man’s leg trying to staunch the bleeding.
Worker Walter Zambrano, 64, said he was fortunate that he was in a bathroom when shooting broke out during a 9 a.m. morning break when workers were gathering in a cafeteria. He hid in the bathroom until the shooting stopped, fearing for his life.
The person was “shooting like crazy, bam! bam! bam!” Zambrano said, speaking in Spanish. “Everyone was screaming, running this way and that. I didn’t know which way to run.”
Harford County Sheriff Jeffrey Gahler told a news conference hours later that the woman had been identified as a temporary employee, Snochia Moseley of Baltimore County. It appears only one weapon was used — a 9 mm Glock handgun that was registered in Moseley’s name — and no shots were fired by responding law enforcement officers, he added.
“She had reported for her workday as usual, and around 9 a.m. the shooting began, striking victims both outside the business and inside the facility,” Gahler said.
He called it a “senseless crime,” adding investigators didn’t have any motive immediately after the shooting.
Three people were fatally shot and three more were wounded but expected to survive, the sheriff said. The victims were not immediately identified. Moseley died at a hospital from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to the sheriff.
The sheriff said the call about shots fired came in at about 9:06 a.m. Thursday and deputies and other officers were on the scene in just over five minutes. The shooting began outside the business and continued inside, he said.
Krystal Watson said her husband Eric works at the facility and told her told her the suspect had been arguing with somebody else near a time clock after a “town hall meeting.”
“And she went off,” she said.
“She didn’t have a particular target. She was just shooting,” Watson said as she left a fire station where relatives sought to be reunited with loved ones.
Susan Henderson, spokeswoman for the drugstore chain Rite Aid, described the building where the shooting took place as a support facility adjacent to a larger building. The company said in a statement that the facility had been closed temporarily and grief counselors were being made available to workers.
The company didn’t immediately respond to an inquiry about Moseley’s employment history.
Mike Carre, an employee of a furniture logistics operation next to the distribution center, said he helped tend to a wounded man who came hobbling in, bleeding from his leg. He called 911 before helping colleagues wrap the man’s bloodsoaked jeans above his injury to cut off blood flow.
Carre said the man told him the shooter “just came in in a bad mood this morning. He said she’s usually nice. But today, I guess it wasn’t her day. She just came in to pick a fight with someone.”
“She pulled out a gun and she just started shooting at her co-workers.”
The attack came nearly three months after a man with a shotgun attacked a newspaper office in Annapolis, Maryland, killing five staff members. Authorities accused Jarrod W. Ramos of attacking The Capital Gazette because of a longstanding grudge against the paper. It came less than a year after a fatal workplace shooting less than 10 miles from the warehouse, in which five were shot, three fatally.
EAST GOSHEN TOWNSHIP, Pa. — A Pennsylvania man who was apparently upset that his ex-wife had been awarded their home in their divorce was found dead early Thursday, several hours after he shot at her and later killed his own parents.
Bruce Rogal, 59, died after a manhunt and a police chase that ended when he crashed his car at the West Bradford Township home he had shared with his wife, Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan said.
State police said at least one trooper shot at Rogal following the crash, but it’s not clear if he returned fire. A gun was found in his car, authorities said, but a cause of death hasn’t been determined.
No troopers were authorities said.
Rogal had received word of an order finalizing the divorce that authorities said was mailed on Wednesday and “that appears to be what set him off,” Hogan said.
Rogal first went to the house where his ex-wife was in the driveway changing her car’s oil, shot at her and missed. He then drove to a retirement center in East Goshen where he shot and killed his parents, William and Nancy Rogal, who were both in their late 80s.
Rogal then drove off, injured, and police soon sent out an alert about the car he was driving. State police spotted the vehicle driving past the agency’s Embreeville Barracks shortly before 1 a.m. Thursday, and a chase ensued that also involved SWAT team members.
Aided by a police helicopter, the troopers were able to follow Rogal a few miles into the West Bradford neighborhood where his ex-wife lives and where the initial shooting incident happened.
The chase ended when Rogal’s crashed his car into the side of the house.
Court documents obtained by the Daily Local News in West Chester, Pennsylvania, showed Rogal’s ex-wife had filed an order of protection from abuse against him in 2015, shortly before filing for divorce.
Rogal’s attorneys had argued the order was a way to gain an upper hand in the divorce and said some of the incidents she had listed in the petition alleging Rogal had threatened or assaulted her. The court ordered him to leave their home.
Authorities confirmed they contacted both the special master who oversaw the divorce and the judge who signed the decree, eventually evacuating the special master from her home Wednesday night as a safety precaution.