Orlando - A man so broke that he said he didn't have the
money to visit his son 30 minutes away opened fire on Friday at the
engineering firm that fired him two years ago, killing one person
and wounding five, authorities said.
As officers led a handcuffed Jason Rodriguez into a police station,
a reporter asked the divorced 40-year-old why he had attacked his
former colleagues.
"Because they left me to rot," said Rodriguez, who
recently told a bankruptcy judge he was making less than $30 000 a
year at a Subway sandwich shop and owed nearly $90 000.
Paralysed Orlando
The shooting on the eighth floor of an office tower paralysed
downtown Orlando for three hours. Police tracked Rodriguez to his
mother's home, spotted him through a window and ordered him to
come out.
He surrendered peacefully and was in custody on Friday evening.
Police said he apologised as officers handcuffed him.
"I'm just going through a tough time right now. I'm
sorry," officers quoted him as saying.
Police say he will be charged with first-degree murder and other
crimes. Officials said he could make an initial court appearance on
Saturday.
All the victims worked at the firm of Reynolds, Smith and Hills,
where Rodriguez was an entry-level engineer for 11 months before he
was let go in June 2007, the company said.
Witnesses recognised shooter
Witnesses told police they recognised Rodriguez when he entered the
company's eighth-floor lobby. They said he pulled a handgun
from a holster under his shirt and shot an employee standing next
to the receptionist's desk, killing him.
The slain victim, identified by police as 26-year-old Otis
Beckford, was hit by at least two bullets. The gunman then went
into the common work area and fired several shots, witnesses said,
wounding five other employees.
The five wounded people were in stable condition at Orlando
hospitals and police say all are expected to survive.
Rodriguez worked on drawings in the firm's transportation
group, but his supervisors said his performance was not up to their
standards, and when he did not improve, he was fired. The company
did not hear from him again.
Company mystified
"This is really a mystery to us," said Ken Jacobson, the
firm's general legal counsel and chief financial officer.
"There was nothing to indicate any hard feelings."
He did not know why Rodriguez would say the company had left him
"to rot."
"It's been two years," Jacobson said. "We
don't know where he's been or what he's
done."
Rodriguez told detectives that the company had fired him without
cause and had made him look incompetent. He told them he was
unemployed for a year and a half before getting a job at Subway,
where worked until recently.
He told them the shop couldn't give him enough hours, and he
later filed for unemployment. He expected to get a check recently
but when it didn't arrive he blamed Reynolds, Smith and Hills,
thinking it was harming his efforts to qualify, police said. He
told them he could no longer support his family.
Plagued by money woes
Rodriguez' bankruptcy filing and his former mother-in-law
suggested he was plagued by money woes.
Les Winograd, a spokesperson for Connecticut-based Subway
Restaurants, said Rodriguez had worked for one of the sandwich
shops in the Orlando area until six weeks ago. He would not say
whether Rodriguez had left or was fired.
His ex-wife's mother, America Holloway, told The Associated
Press that Rodriguez and her daughter, Neshby, were married for
about six years before divorcing several years ago. They have an
8-year-old son who lives with Neshby in Kissimmee, about half an
hour away.
Holloway said the couple lived with her in Orlando for several
years while they were married and that Rodriguez abused her
daughter and once threw all her clothes into the street.
"I used to tell my daughter he was crazy," Holloway said.
"He was always fighting, always yelling. There was always
problems."
Shooter's son
After the divorce, Rodriguez seldom saw his son, but he called last
week while the child was at Holloway's house and the boy asked
his father why he did not come over, too.
"He said, 'Because I don't have any money. I don't
have a job. I don't have anything to eat. When things get
better, I'll come see you,"' Holloway said Rodriguez
told his son.
Charles Price, an attorney who represented Rodriguez in his
bankruptcy case, said he could not comment on specifics of the
matter. He had not seen Rodriguez since the summer.
The Orlando Sentinel reported on its website that Rodriguez was
detained by the Orange County Sheriff's Office in June 2007
after it received a report that he was a "danger to self and
others".
After the lunchtime shooting, some people streamed out of the
Legion Place building while others holed up in their offices. A
major highway was closed, and nearby schools were locked
down.
- Associated Press writers Travis Reed, Kelli Kennedy, Jennifer
Kay, Laura Wides-Munoz, David Fischer and Damian Grass in Miami;
Mitch Stacy and Tamara Lush in Orlando; and Christine Armario in
Tampa contributed to this report.
AP |