Deadly Hostage Situation in New York

[Kodiak]

Developing story from CNN

CNN) -- Authorities are at the scene of a building in Binghamton, New York, where there are "multiple" shooting victims and hostages are being held, a county spokesman said.

Broome County Director of Emergency Services Brett Chellis said there is an "active" shooting situation at the American Civic Association, and that several law enforcement agencies are at the scene.

Chellis did not provide numbers of victims or hostages, and had no further details.

The local newspaper, the Press & Sun-Bulletin, said on its Web site that at least four people were shot and 41 people had been taken hostage. The newspaper reported that Binghamton Mayor Matthew Ryan, who was at the scene, said there was a hostage situation and said the shooter had a high-powered rifle.

FBI spokesman Richard Kolko said the FBI is sending hostage negotiators and an evidence response team to the scene.

The newspaper said the incident began around 10:30 a.m. ET. Nearby apartments were being evacuated and Binghamton High School is on lockdown, it said.

"Within minutes [the situation] turned into one just flooded with police," Bob Joseph, news director of WNBF Radio, told CNN.

The American Civic Association helps immigrants and refugees with a number of issues, including personal counseling, resettlement, citizenship and reunification, and provides interpreters and translators, according to a United Way of Broome County Web site, which is affiliated with the association.

Binghamton is about 140 miles northwest of New York City.

With 41 hostages this could get very bad very quickly. Here's hoping New York's finest can pull this one out of the fire.

[Fleet Admiral JD]

The motive seems pretty clear--"That place helps them durned immigrants! I don't want them takin' mah job and takin' over mah counry!"

[Darth Wong]

Or it could be an immigrant who's about to be turfed out of the country and has gone berserk. Or a disgruntled employee.

[Fleet Admiral JD]

True enough. I guess I'm jaded enough to go with the racist option. <<Shrug>>

On another note, conservatives waste no time monopolizing: http://www.debbieschlussel.com/archives ... n_man.html

[Superman]

Damn. Hopefully no more lives will be lost, except for his.

[Edi]

As far as our news reported this, 13 dead, maybe a few more, shooter is dead now and situation over.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Was watching this in the teacher's lounge. Gunman barricaded himself in a room and then killed himself. Also they think he may have been vietnamese.

[Straha]

I was on the scene before. I'll post more later. The shooter was an asian male, there are 13 dead on scene, possibly more. There were around 6 injuries. Everything is quiet now, kind of boring.

[Redleader34]

I have been in and out of class, how bad is it Straha?

[Superman]

Goddamn, shit like this makes me fucking mental. Glad to know that a dime won't be spent on his trial or incarceration though; not that it means anything to the people who are now dead. Fuck.

[Straha]

I have been in and out of class, how bad is it Straha?

Just got back from a press conference with the Governor:

-14 dead. 1 Receptionist, 13 in a classroom.

-They think the shooter shot himself, but aren't sure. They made that judgment because they found a man with a satchel with pistol ammo in it, and found two pistols at the scene, but they stressed they aren't 100% certain of it, yet.

- The person who made the initial 911 call was a receptionist who was shot and played dead before crawling under her desk and playing opossum to make the call.

- The scene itself was rather hectic, they had multiple SWAT vans, over a dozen ambulances and six different police services (including ATF and others) on site.

- There were 36 (I think, maybe 37 I don't have my notes in front of me) survivors. 20 of them survived by hiding in a boiler room for three hours while the SWAT team cleared the building.

- A number of men taken out of the building in question were detained, but only because of procedure for situations like this and are not considered suspects.

- The shooter backed up his car to the backdoor of the building to make it impossible for people to get out while he was shooting them.

-According to comment VP Biden has told the Governor and Mayor that his sympathy and condolences are with them, and that Federal help will come. President Obama has also offered his support, but is currently tied up in Europe and has made no open comment on this.

I'll give you guys more as I get more.

[Straha]

A few other things:

- The situation was never a hostage situation. The gunmen entered the building, shot the receptionists, then entered a class room and shot everyone in it before shooting himself. The receptionist who was shot and called 911 (and was in critical condition undergoing surgery this afternoon) thought she heard him going down a hallway and reported as such to the police when they were debriefing her. As such they treated the scene as if the shooter was still alive. However we know now that he wasn't.

- The shooter only used a pistol. He may have had two (there were two pistols found on the scene and the police, understandably, did not elaborate on the situation) but that was it. He did not have a high powered rifle or an assault rifle.

-Police were on the scene two minutes after receiving a 911 call and the chief was there in 3.

If anyone has questions I've been fielding interviews all day with a number of stations, NPR, BBC and even :: sigh:: Fox News. I'm more than willing to answer some questions here.

[NoXion]

Any idea why the guy did this?

[Raj Ahten]

I suppose it is far too early to guess as to the motive of this shooting correct? Any idea yet as to the identity of the shooter?

Also given all the conflicting reports in the media about a high power rifle and so forth, it seems that yet again the best option for those not involved in the incident is to wait awhile for the facts to come out.

[Straha]

I suppose it is far too early to guess as to the motive of this shooting correct?

Yes. That being said there is a rumor about that the shooter was an immigrant former employee of IBM who was laid off recently. While the police, governor, etc. were clear that they didn't have any confirmation on the identity of the shooter yet they did deign to answer questions on the man being laid off from IBM, which gives some credence to that rumor.

Any idea yet as to the identity of the shooter?

There are rumors that a man named Jiverly Wong is the shooter, see above though.

[The Romulan Republic]

Is it usual for a shooting with that many casualties to be done with nothing but pistols?

[CaptainChewbacca]

Is it usual for a shooting with that many casualties to be done with nothing but pistols?

Georgia Tech was just pistols. If you've got people in confined quarters with no exit, it's all you need. Why do they keep mentioning he was a former IBM employee? He didn't shoot up an IBM office.

[Glocksman]

Is it usual for a shooting with that many casualties to be done with nothing but pistols?

It depends upon your definition of 'usual'.
A determined assailant armed with a pistol can shoot a lot of unarmed victims.
My guess is that he used a couple of semi automatic pistols.

Semiautos offer the advantage of quick reloading, though if none of the victims were armed or at least willing to try and struggle with the perp*, then even a couple of revolvers would have sufficed.

That said, I wish these nutjobs would just simply kill themselves rather than make others suffer because of their own failures in life.




*I'm NOT condemning the victims as the huge majority of us would hesitate in confronting an armed killer in the process of reloading his weapon.
While I *hope* I'd do exactly that, I'm not going to play internet tough guy and claim that I would have.

[Straha]

Is it usual for a shooting with that many casualties to be done with nothing but pistols?

Georgia Tech was just pistols. If you've got people in confined quarters with no exit, it's all you need. Why do they keep mentioning he was a former IBM employee? He didn't shoot up an IBM office.

Regional thing. IBM was founded in Binghamton and was a major source of employment in the area. IBM mostly left in the late 90s and the area has promptly turned into a major shithole which will probably never recover. There's some anger at IBM for this and a lot of quiet resentment from everyone who stayed in the area. So there's that. Also it gives people something kind of concrete to stick to a man who we otherwise know nothing about.

[loomer]

There's a conspiracy out there about this already. The nutters over on InfoWars think it was a cover up for an assassination. Got anything that'll make them shut the fuck up, Straha?

[Straha]

There's a conspiracy out there about this already. The nutters over on InfoWars think it was a cover up for an assassination. Got anything that'll make them shut the fuck up, Straha?

An assassination of whom? A receptionist? A bunch of immigrants trying to learn English? Perhaps an English as a second language teacher?

There's nobody actually important there. Just a bunch of people trying to make a better life for themselves and their families and trying to help fit in in their new country, and people who want to help them do just that. What makes them worthy enough to be subjects of wide spread conspiracy and assassination?!

[loomer]

I've got no idea, but bear in mind these are the same people who think flu shots are mind control and Obama is the chosen leader for the New World Order. So generally just point out there was no one important in the building, you reckon?

[Darth Onasi]

I've got no idea, but bear in mind these are the same people who think flu shots are mind control and Obama is the chosen leader for the New World Order. So generally just point out there was no one important in the building, you reckon?

Some people will simply refuse to accept that people are capable of such random and brutal acts of violence, so there *must* be a true reason. There *must* be order to this. To such people I doubt any argument will get through to them.

[CJvR]

Read that the Talibans in Pakistan are claiming credits for this.
They probably hoped it was an arab doing the shooting rather than a Vietnamese.

[Mayabird]

Is it usual for a shooting with that many casualties to be done with nothing but pistols?

Georgia Tech was just pistols. If you've got people in confined quarters with no exit, it's all you need. Why do they keep mentioning he was a former IBM employee? He didn't shoot up an IBM office.

You mean Virginia Tech, right?

Every time I see another one of these cases, I think that "some loser dude grabbing a gun and shooting a bunch of random people before killing himself" must be the latest fad. Something like this seems to be happening every day now.