5 killed in shooting at newspaper building in Maryland

ANNAPOLIS, Md. – A gunman opened fire in a targeted attack on a newspaper office in Maryland’s capital Thursday, killing five people including veteran journalist  Rob Hiaasen, the brother of best-selling author and long-time columnist for the Miami Herald Carl Hiaasen. 

Rob Hiaasen, who grew up in Fort Lauderdale, graduated from the University of Florida and worked for The Palm Beach Post. He joined the Capital Gazette in 2010.

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"I just want people to know what an in­cred­ibly gentle, generous and gifted guy my brother was," Carl Hiaasen told the Washington Post. "He was an unforgettably warm and uplifting presence as a father and brother, but he also had dedicated his whole life to journalism."

"He was a tall man, 6-foot-5, but he was a giant not just in stature but in character," Rob Hiaasen's wife, Maria Hiaasen, told the Baltimore Sun. 

"He loves words, he loves humor," she said. "He loved journalism, he loved helping those young writers at the Gazette."

Jon Morgan, a former editor at the Baltimore Sun, told Miami Herald reporter David Ovalle that he had worked with Rob Hiaasen at the Baltimore Sun, where Hiaasen worked for 15 years. 

"He had a zeal for writing and finding good stories," Morgan told The Miami Herald. "On the darkest days of cutbacks and layoffs in journalism, Rob was an inspiration."

Authorities identified the four other victims Wendi Winters, a special publications editor, Rebecca Smith, a sales assistant, Gerald Fischman, an editorial page editor, and John McNamara, a staff writer. 

The gunman -- identified as Jarrod W. Ramos -- also wounded two others before being taken into custody in what appeared to be one of the deadliest attacks on journalists in U.S. history, police and witnesses said.

Police said the suspect was a white man in his late 30s whose rampage at The Capital Gazette followed social media threats directed at the newspaper. Authorities said the man entered the building and “looked for his victims.” He threw smoke grenades and fired a shotgun at his victims, according to Anne Arundel County Acting Police Chief William Krampf.

“This person was prepared today to come in, this person was prepared to shoot people. His intent was to cause harm,” Krampf said.

Krampf declined to identify the suspect but said he was a Maryland resident and search warrants were being sought for his home. Ramos, the suspected gunman, had an unsuccessful defamation suit against the newspaper.

Phil Davis, a reporter who covers courts and crime for the paper, tweeted that the gunman shot out the glass door to the office and fired into the newsroom, sending people scrambling for cover under desks.

“A single shooter shot multiple people at my office, some of whom are dead,” he wrote.

Davis added: “There is nothing more terrifying than hearing multiple people get shot while you’re under your desk and then hear the gunman reload.”

The attacker had mutilated his fingers in an apparent attempt to make it harder to identify him, according to a law enforcement official who was not authorized to discuss the investigation and spoke on condition of anonymity. Another official who also spoke on condition of anonymity said investigators identified the man using facial recognition technology.

The shooting — which came amid months of verbal and online attacks on the “fake news media” from politicians and others from President Donald Trump on down— prompted New York City police to immediately tighten security at news organizations in the nation’s media capital.

At the White House, spokeswoman Lindsay Walters said: “There is no room for violence, and we stick by that. Violence is never tolerated in any form, no matter whom it is against.”

The gunman, whose name was not immediately released, was believed to have used a shotgun, according to a U.S. official who was briefed on the investigation but not authorized to discuss it publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. The gunman was not carrying any identification, authorities said.

“The shooter has not been very forthcoming, so we don’t have any information yet on motive,” Anne Arundel County Executive Steve Schuh said. “To my knowledge, there was no verbal aspect to the incident where he declared his motives or anything else, so at this point we just don’t know.”

Krampf confirmed five deaths and said two people had superficial wounds. Authorities had said earlier that several people were gravely wounded.

Police spokesman Lt. Ryan Frashure said officers raced to the scene, arriving in 60 seconds, and took the gunman into custody without an exchange of gunfire.

About 170 people in all were evacuated from the building as a multitude of police cars and other emergency vehicles converged on the scene. People could be seen leaving the building with their hands up.

The newspaper is part of Capital Gazette Communications, which also publishes the Maryland Gazette and CapitalGazette.com.

In an interview with The Capital Gazette’s online site, Davis said it “was like a war zone” inside the newspaper’s offices — a situation that would be “hard to describe for a while.”

“I’m a police reporter. I write about this stuff — not necessarily to this extent, but shootings and death — all the time,” he said. “But as much as I’m going to try to articulate how traumatizing it is to be hiding under your desk, you don’t know until you’re there and you feel helpless.”

Davis told the paper he and others were still hiding under their desks when the gunman stopped firing.

“I don’t know why. I don’t know why he stopped,” he said.

Annapolis Mayor Gavin Buckley said the community is grieving the attack on the community paper.

“These are the guys that come to city council meetings, have to listen to boring politicians and sit there,” Buckley said. “They don’t make a lot of money It’s just immoral that their lives should be in danger.”

New York police sent counterterrorism teams to news organizations around the city in a move authorities said was a precaution, not prompted by any specific threat. Police could be seen outside The New York Times, ABC News and Fox News early in the evening.