Eighty-nine-year-old white supremacist goes on shooting spree in Washington Holocaust museum
Pastor Dale Morgan
Eighty-nine-year-old white supremacist goes on shooting spree in
Washington Holocaust museum*
An 89-year-old man with ties to white supremacist groups shot and
injured a security guard at the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington
yesterday, before he was hit in an exchange of fire that spread fear and
panic in the heart of the capital's tourist area.
By Alex Spillius in Washington
Published: 8:58PM BST 10 Jun 2009
The gunman, identified by NBC News as James von Brünn, started firing
with a rifle as soon as he walked into the museum at 12.50pm, striking
his victim at close range.
Two other security guards returned fire, injuring the suspect, who was
taken to the George Washington University hospital and was said to be in
critical condition. The guard, who was not named, was in a "grave"
condition, according to police.
Police sources said that Mr von Brünn had written a book and had a
website that raged against Jews and Christianity.
They said he had connections with white supremacist and anti-government
organisations and served time in prison after walking into the Federal
Reserve in 1981 and attempting to take staff members hostage over high
interest rates. His website claims he was a Second World War veteran.
The shooting came days after President Barack Obama visited the former
Buchenwald concentration camp in Germany alongside survivors of the
Holocaust.
Witnesses said that after the first shots rang out, tourists started
screaming and museum staff yelled at them to hit the floor.
Like others, Angela Andelson, 22, visiting from San Francisco, said she
heard five or six shots.
"I was by the entrance when the gunman came in. I heard a shot and
though it was sort of a loud, like someone had dropped something," she said.
"And I see all these security guards kind of like ducking. When I turned
and looked there were maybe two to four more shots that I heard," she
continued, adding "people were screaming and ducking down getting on the
floor, getting under benches."
Within a few minutes staff instructed visitors to "run like hell and not
look back" to available exits, another witness said.
The museum, located on the National Mall, attracts 1.7 million visitors
each year.