XPost: alt.private.investigator, alt.sci.sociology, alt.america   
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   From: thanks.democrats@splcenter.org   
      
   Classification: Mass murderer   
   Characteristics: Revenge   
   Number of victims: 5   
   Date of murders: April 3, 1995   
   Date of birth: 1967   
   Victims profile: Walter Rossler, 62, and Joann Rossler, 61 (his   
   former boss and his wife); Richard Lee Tomlinson, 34; Derek   
   Harrison, 35; and Patty J. "Wendy" Brunson Gilmore, 41   
   (employees)   
   Method of murder: Shooting (Ruger 9mm pistol and a .32 revolver)   
   Location: Corpus Christi, Texas, USA   
   Status: Committed suicide by shooting himself the same day   
      
   Entered the Walter Rossler Co. through the front door and shot   
   five people with a 9 mm. semiautomatic pistol and .32-caliber   
   revolver.   
      
   He then left the business through the back door, and shot   
   himself behind the building.   
      
   Another one from the disgruntled-ex-employee-returns-on-a-   
   rampage file.   
      
   On April 3, 1995, 28-year-old James Simpson walked into the   
   Walter Rossler Co., a refinery inspection company in Corpus   
   Christi, Texas, and killed his former boss, his wife and three   
   other employees. He then walked out the back door and shot   
   himself.   
      
   Date: April 3, 1995   
      
   Location: Walter Rossler Company, Corpus Christi, Texas   
      
   Alleged Shooter: James Daniel Simpson   
      
   People Killed: Six (shooter committed suicide)   
      
   People Injured: None   
      
   Firearm(s): Ruger 9mm pistol and a .32 revolver   
      
   Circumstances   
      
   James Simpson entered his former workplace, Walter Rossler Co.,   
   systematically shooting employees at point-blank range before   
   going out the back door and fatally shooting himself in the   
   head. He had worked as a metallurgist for a year at the company   
   before quitting in September 1994. According to police, the   
   motive for the shooting was Simpson's apparent depression.   
      
   How Firearm(s) Acquired   
      
   The firearms were purchased legally, however, police would not   
   release any information to the public. Simpson had no criminal   
   record or mental illness history that would have prevented him   
   from buying firearms.   
      
   Guman kills 5, then himself   
      
   Texas city is rocked by wave of violence   
      
   The Phoenix Gazette   
      
   April 4, 1995   
      
   A gunman inflicted more bloodshed on an already grieving city by   
   shooting to death five people at his former workplace before   
   killing himself, police said.   
      
   Hours before the Monday afternoon massacre at a refinery   
   inspection company, family and friends of slain Tejano music   
   sensation Selena had bid her a tearful farewell.   
      
   Guman kills himself, 5 others in Texas   
      
   An ex-employee opened fire at a refinery inspection firm in   
   Corpus Christi. The owner and his wife died.   
      
   The Philadelphia Inquirer   
      
   April 4, 1995   
      
   A former employee opened fire yesterday at a refinery inspection   
   company, killing the owner, his wife and three workers before   
   fatally shooting himself, police said.   
      
   James Simpson, 28, entered the Walter Rossler Co. through the   
   front door and shot five people with a 9mm semiautomatic pistol   
   and .32-caliber revolver, police said. He then left the business   
   through the back door, and shot himself behind the building.   
      
   Mother, baby spared as gunman killed 5   
      
   The Fort Worth Star-Telegram   
      
   April 4, 1995   
      
   CORPUS CHRISTI - A 24-year-old woman clutching her infant son   
   was the only person to survive a face-to-face encounter with   
   gunman James Simpson as he walked through his former place of   
   employment Monday, methodically killing five people and them   
   himself.   
      
   Lisa Rossler told police she screamed, "Don't shoot" when   
   Simpson walked in to face her. She said she was holding her   
   infant son and calling frantically for police help.   
      
   Suspect analyzed in Corpus Christi slayings   
      
   The Fort Worth Star-Telegram   
      
   April 5, 1995   
      
   Experts in aberrant crime say that James Simpson, 28, almost   
   certainly was both paranoid and depressed Monday when he is said   
   to have fatally shot five people and then killed himself outside   
   the Walter Rossler Co. in Corpus Christi.   
      
   "Of all crimes, the one most closely associated with serious   
   mental illness is mass murder," said Dr. Park Elliott Dietz, a   
   forensic psychiatrist who has studied mass killers. "They are   
   not schizophrenic," Dietz added, "but they all show signs of   
   depression and paranoia."   
      
   Victims' families see season of renewal   
      
   Emotional wounds still healing 5 years after Rossler Company   
   slayings   
      
   By Dan Parker - Caller-Times   
      
   Monday, April 3, 2000   
      
   When Rhonda Rossler-Fowler looks at her 2 1/2-year-old daughter,   
   Taylor, she sees something of her parents, Walter and Joann   
   Rossler.   
      
   "There's a lot of little traits she's carried on," Rossler-   
   Fowler said. "She sleeps just like my mother did, with her   
   little arm over her face. And maybe there's my dad's   
   stubbornness. That's why he was so successful. He was very set   
   in his mind what he was going to do."   
      
   Walter and Joann Rossler were among five people murdered five   
   years ago today at the Rossler Company, a refinery inspection   
   business now called Petrochem, on Rand Morgan Road. The killer,   
   a former employee named James Daniel Simpson, took his own life   
   as police closed in.   
      
   For Rossler-Fowler and other relatives of the victims, emotional   
   scars inflicted by the massacre will never go away. But   
   religious faith, time and support from friends, relatives and   
   the community have gone a long way toward healing family   
   members' wounds.   
      
   And births in the families during the past five years have   
   charged them with a spirit of renewal.   
      
   "I really believe God has a purpose," Rossler-Fowler said. "He   
   needed our mother and dad, and I don't want to say he replaced   
   them, but it's kind of like when you pick a flower - another one   
   grows."   
      
   In addition to killing Walter Rossler, 62, and Joann Rossler,   
   61, Simpson also gunned down Richard Lee Tomlinson, 34; Derek   
   Harrison, 35; and Patty J. "Wendy" Brunson Gilmore, 41.   
      
   At the time of the shootings, Corpus Christi still was reeling   
   from the murder three days earlier of Tejano star Selena   
   Quintanilla-Perez. National media already in Corpus Christi   
   covering Selena's murder pounced on the Rossler story.   
      
   "As far as I can remember, that is probably the worst that ever   
   has occurred in this city as far as a situation involving a   
   disgruntled (former) employee," said Corpus Christi Police Chief   
   Pete Alvarez. "To go to the extreme of returning and killing   
   five individuals, that is something very tragic.   
      
   "Certainly, that brings a lot of folks together in the community   
   to focus on things unexpected," Alvarez said. "I guess it kind   
   of opens your eyes to reality, that these things do occur.   
   Sometimes, we read about these things in the paper, sometimes   
   they occur elsewhere, but when it hits home, it really has an   
   impact on a community."   
      
   Slow recovery   
      
   Rossler-Fowler and her sister, Lisa Rossler-Duff, sold the   
   Walter Rossler Company about 18 months after the shootings.   
      
   Today, Rossler-Fowler is a homemaker living in Calallen. She is   
   married to Cliff Fowler, a coach at Calallen Middle School.   
      
   Rossler-Fowler said she has recovered a little more each of the   
   past five years since the shootings. But anniversaries of the   
   shootings always get her down.   
      
      
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