Police and first responders
are seen outside the scene of a shooting at The Capital Gazette building (seen in the back right of the image) in Annapolis, Maryland on June 28. Authorities have taken a suspect into custody. Related story on
ANNAPOLIS (Reuters) — A man who had a longrunning feud with an Annapolis newspaper blasted his way through its newsroom with a shotgun on Thursday, killing at least five people in one of the deadliest attacks recorded on a US media outlet, authorities said.
Jarrod Warren Ramos, the suspect in what police called a “targeted attack” on Capital Gazette, has been charged with five counts of first-degree murder, according to court records.
Ramos, 38, is scheduled to have a bail hearing today in Annapolis.
“This was a targeted attack on the Capital Gazette,” Acting police chief of the Anne Arundel County Police Department William Krampf said. “This person was prepared to shoot people. His intent was to cause harm.”
The suspect is Jarrod Ramos, 38, of Laurel, the Capital Gazette and Baltimore Sun reported, citing law enforcement.
Anne Arundel County police said on Twitter that due to investigative reasons, they have not released the name of the suspect in custody, adding that as of Thursday evening, the suspect has not been booked.
In 2012, Ramos brought a defamation lawsuit against Eric Hartley, formerly a staff writer and columnist with publication The Capital, and Thomas Marquardt, then editor and publisher of The Capital, according to a court filing. In 2015, Maryland’s secondhighest court upheld a ruling in favor of the Capital Gazette and a former reporter who were accused by Ramos 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 that the contents of the article were accurate and based on public records, the document showed.
Ramos said on Twitter that 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.”
Police are treating the shooting as a local incident, with no links to terrorism, a law enforcement source told Reuters. Krampf did not say why the gunman may have targeted the newspaper or its employees.
When police found the suspect, his weapon was on the ground and “not in his immediate proximity,” Steve Schuh, Anne Arundel County executive, told cable news station CNN.
Police said they recovered what they thought might have been an explosive device but Krampf later said the suspect had smoke grenades. Investigators were in the process of securing his Maryland residence and obtaining search warrants, he said.
The suspect appeared to have damaged his fingertips to try to avoid detection and was refusing to cooperate with law enforcement, Baltimore TV station WJZ and other local media reported. Krampf did not comment on those reports.
Capital Gazette runs multiple newspapers out of its Annapolis office and the group includes one of the oldest newspapers in the United States, The
Gazette, which traces its origins back to 1727.