XPost: alt.crime, alt.politics.democrats, alt.news-media   
   XPost: misc.survivalism   
   From: jthomq@gmail.com   
      
   SAN JOSE, Calif. — A gunman who killed nine people at a   
   California rail yard appeared to target some of the victims as   
   he fired 39 shots, a sheriff told The Associated Press on   
   Thursday, a day after his ex-wife said he would stew about   
   perceived slights at work and threatened to kill co-workers a   
   decade ago.   
      
   The shooter arrived at the light rail facility for the Valley   
   Transportation Authority in San Jose around 6 a.m. Wednesday   
   with a duffel bag filled with semi-automatic handguns and high-   
   capacity magazines, Santa Clara County Sheriff Laurie Smith said   
   in an interview.   
      
   “It appears to us at this point that he said to one of the   
   people there: ‘I’m not going to shoot you,’” Smith said. “And   
   then he shot other people. So I imagine there was some kind of   
   thought on who he wanted to shoot.”   
      
   While there are no cameras inside the rail yard’s two buildings,   
   Smith said footage captured him moving from one location to the   
   next. It took deputies six minutes from the first 911 calls to   
   find the gunman on the third floor of one of the buildings,   
   Smith said.   
      
   He killed himself as deputies closed in on the facility serving   
   the county of more than 1 million people in the heart of Silicon   
   Valley. More than 100 people were there at the time, and   
   authorities found five victims in one building and two in   
   another, Smith said.   
      
   Authorities do not yet know whether the gunman had worked   
   regularly with any of the victims. Investigators were serving   
   search warrants for his home and cellphone, seeking to determine   
   what prompted the bloodshed, the sheriff said.   
      
   “I’m not sure we’ll ever actually find the real motive, but   
   we’ll piece it together as much as we can from witnesses,” she   
   said.   
      
   The attacker was identified as 57-year-old Samuel Cassidy,   
   according to two law enforcement officials who were not   
   authorized to discuss the investigation publicly and spoke to   
   the AP on condition of anonymity.   
      
   The three handguns he had appear to be legal, sheriff’s   
   officials said. Authorities do not yet know how he obtained them.   
      
   He also had 11 high-capacity magazines, each with 12 rounds. In   
   California, it is illegal to buy magazines that hold more than   
   10 rounds. However, if Cassidy had obtained them before Jan. 1,   
   2000, he would be allowed to have them unless he was otherwise   
   prohibited from possessing firearms.   
      
   The sheriff said authorities found explosives at the gunman’s   
   home, where investigators believe he had set a timer or slow-   
   burn device so that a fire would occur at the same time as the   
   shooting. Flames were reported minutes after the first 911 calls   
   came in from the rail facility.   
      
   Cassidy’s ex-wife said he had talked about killing people at   
   work more than a decade ago.   
      
   “I never believed him, and it never happened. Until now,” a   
   tearful Cecilia Nelms told the AP on Wednesday.   
      
   She said he used to come home from work resentful and angry over   
   what he perceived as unfair assignments.   
      
   “He could dwell on things,” she said. The two were married for   
   about 10 years until a 2005 divorce filing, and she had not been   
   in touch with Cassidy for about 13 years, Nelms said.   
      
   The attack was the 15th mass killing in the U.S. this year, all   
   shootings that claimed at least four lives each for a total of   
   87 deaths, according to a database compiled by The Associated   
   Press, USA Today and Northeastern University.   
      
   President Joe Biden urged Congress to act on legislation to curb   
   gun violence, saying, “Every life that is taken by a bullet   
   pierces the soul of our nation. We can, and we must, do more.”   
      
   The shooting killed employees who had been bus and light rail   
   operators, mechanics, linemen and an assistant superintendent   
   over the course of their careers.   
      
   They were Alex Ward Fritch, 49; Paul Delacruz Megia, 42;   
   Taptejdeep Singh, 36; Adrian Balleza, 29; Jose Dejesus   
   Hernandez, 35; Timothy Michael Romo, 49; Michael Joseph   
   Rudometkin, 40; Abdolvahab Alaghmandan, 63, and Lars Kepler   
   Lane, 63.   
      
   Family and friends remembered Singh as a hero. He called another   
   transit employee to warn him about Cassidy, saying he needed to   
   get out or hide.   
      
   “He told me he was with Paul, another victim, at the time,” co-   
   worker Sukhvir Singh, who is not related to Taptejdeep Singh,   
   said in a statement. “From what I’ve heard, he spent the last   
   moments of his life making sure that others — in the building   
      
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