A public transit worker shot dead eight co-workers and wounded another before taking his own life on Wednesday in the state of California, United States.
According to Al Jazeera, the shooting took place in the morning local time at a light rail facility operated by the Valley Transportation Authority (VTA), a major transit service located next to the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Department.
Multiple local news outlets identified the alleged shooter as 57-year-old Samuel Cassidy, a technician at Valley Transportation Authority (VTA), who died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Multiple victims were also wounded in the attack at the train maintenance compound in San Jose, just south of San Francisco, reports AFP.
The law enforcement officers had rushed to the spot upon receiving 911 calls “reporting gunshots”, and entered the compound during an “active shooting,” said Russell Davis, a Santa Clara County Sheriff’s deputy.
However, the Sheriff’s deputy did not inform how the shooter died or whether police officers called to the scene had fired their weapons.
The deadly attack, which drew messages of concern and condemnation from US lawmakers, is the latest of several recent mass shootings in various parts of the country.
“It feels like this happens over and over and over again, rinse and repeat, rinse and repeat,” California Governor Gavin Newsom said. “It begs the damn question: What the hell’s going on in the United States of America? What the hell’s wrong with us?”
It is to be mentioned that mass shootings have occurred in recent months at a FedEx facility in Indianapolis, an office building in California, a grocery store in Colorado and at several spas in Atlanta.
There were more than 43,000 gun-related deaths in the United States last year, including suicides, according to the Gun Violence Archive.
US President Joe Biden last month branded US gun violence an “epidemic” and an “international embarrassment.”
(Source: AFP, Al Jazeera, Reuters, Sky News)
