Warehouse worker opens fire, killing 3 people, then herself

Heavily armed FBI agents help secure the scene after a shooting Thursday at an industrial business park in Harford County, Md.
Heavily armed FBI agents help secure the scene after a shooting Thursday at an industrial business park in Harford County, Md.

ABERDEEN, Md. -- A 26-year-old woman reported to work Thursday at a Maryland warehouse and got into an argument, then used a gun to kill three people and wound several others before taking her own life, according to authorities and a witness account.

The suspect was a temporary employee at the Rite Aid distribution center in northeastern Maryland, Harford County Sheriff Jeffrey Gahler said at a news conference. Gahler's officer later identified the woman as Snochia Moseley of Baltimore County.

"She had reported for her workday as usual, and about 9 a.m. the shooting began, striking victims both outside the business and inside the facility," Gahler said. "We do not at this time have a motive for this senseless crime."

Krystal Watson, 33, said her husband, Eric, works at the facility and told her that 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 drove away from a fire station where relatives tried to reunite with loved ones.

The sheriff said the call about shots fired arrived at 9:06 a.m., 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.

It appears only one weapon was used -- a 9mm Glock handgun that was registered in Moseley's name -- and no shots were fired by responding law enforcement officers, Gahler said.

Walter Zambrano, 64, who described himself as a worker at the distribution center, said he was in the bathroom when shooting broke out and he saw nothing as he hid, frightened for his life.

The person was "shooting like crazy," Zambrano said, speaking in Spanish.

He said the gunfire seemed to go on several minutes, and when it was over he sprinted outdoors. On the way out, he said he saw a female co-worker down on the floor. The scene, he said, was one of chaos.

"Everyone was screaming, running this way and that. I didn't know which way to run," he said.

The sheriff said three people were fatally shot and three more were wounded but were expected to survive. They were not immediately identified. Moseley died at a hospital from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, Gahler said.

Area hospitals reported receiving five patients from the shooting.

Susan Henderson, a spokesman 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 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 hobbled in, bleeding from his leg. Carre called 911 from a bathroom before helping colleagues wrap the man's blood-soaked jeans above his injury to cut off blood flow, he said.

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."

Harford County Executive Barry Glassman said that, unfortunately, incidents like this are "becoming a too-often occurrence not only in Harford County but in the country."

The attack came nearly three months after a man with a shotgun attacked a newspaper office in Annapolis, Md., killing five staff members. Authorities accused Jarrod W. Ramos of attacking The Capital Gazette because of a longstanding grudge against the paper.

Thursday's shooting came less than a year after a fatal workplace shooting less than 10 miles from the warehouse, in which five people were shot, three fatally. And it followed another shooting Wednesday in Wisconsin in which authorities say a gunman shot four co-workers before being killed by police officers.

Information for this article was contributed by Eric Tucker, Bill Cormier, Sarah Rankin and Sarah Brumfield of The Associated Press.

photo

AP/STEVE RUARK

Officers at the scene of a shooting Thursday in Harford County, Md., listen to JoWanda Strickland-Lucas near a warehouse where a 26-year-old woman got into an argument after reporting to work and opened fire, killing three people and wounding several others before killing herself, authorities said.

A Section on 09/21/2018

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