WASHINGTON -- A man charged in a crime rampage that left a Census Bureau guard dead and a police officer wounded was previously convicted of manslaughter and recently was arrested in an assault case regarding his girlfriend, according to court documents obtained Friday.
Ronald Anderson, 48, was arrested Feb. 17 on a charge of assaulting his girlfriend in the Washington, D.C., suburb of Prince George's County, according to court records. He was released the day of his arrest.
The officer responding to a domestic dispute call said that the man's girlfriend was clearly afraid.
"The victim was shaking, crying and was whispering while speaking because she was afraid of the suspect hearing her," the officer wrote, according to the documents.
The woman, whose 10-month-old son was home, told police that Anderson had hit her several times, knocking her into walls, because he thought she was looking at another man, the records say.
Another court record filed in District of Columbia Superior Court shows that Anderson pleaded guilty to manslaughter while armed in 1991 in Washington. No other details were immediately available about that case.
On Thursday, authorities said Anderson kidnapped a woman, fatally shot a Census Bureau guard and led police on a car chase through Maryland and Washington before authorities cornered him in an exchange of gunfire that left Anderson and a police officer wounded.
Anderson, who remained hospitalized in an unknown condition Friday, was charged with armed kidnapping and assault on a police officer. More serious charges could follow in the jurisdiction where the guard was killed.
Anderson turned 48 the same day as the shooting. A drug charge related to his February case had been set for a dismissal hearing Friday, but that was canceled. The trial on the assault charge is set for July.
The wounded officer is recovering. The Census Bureau guard who was shot, Lawrence Buckner, died at a hospital in Cheverly, Md., on Thursday night.
Buckner, 59, had served for about eight years in the U.S. Army and worked in the security field for more than two decades, according to a Friday statement from Hunt Valley, Md.-based company Master Security, where Buckner was a contractor working for the federal government.
Buckner, leaves behind a wife, son and four grandchildren as well.
The same woman from February's assault is listed as Thursday's kidnapping victim in a Metropolitan Police Department report released Friday. She was found safe.
The woman was taken at gunpoint from her home Thursday, the report said. A short time later, at the Census Bureau in Suitland, Md., a guard saw two people fighting in a car that matched the description of the vehicle in the kidnapping, Metropolitan Police Chief Cathy Lanier said Thursday.
When the guard approached the car, the man shot him and took off, crossing the border back into the nation's capital and firing at police who chased him, Lanier said.
He fired again at them during the chase before police blocked him and collided with his car, Lanier said. Cornered, the suspect opened fire again and police shot back. Anderson and an officer were hit.
The shooting "was a tragic and scary event for the Census Bureau family," agency Director John Thompson said in a Friday statement.
"We know the situation last night was tense, especially for the hundreds of employees who sheltered in the building and in their cars for several hours not knowing when the incident would be over," he said.
A Section on 04/11/2015