I know I am late to the party with this story but real life got in the way.
A lone gunman wounded a security guard at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum on Wednesday before being wounded himself by return fire, police said.
The suspect was identified as James von Brunn, an 88-year-old white supremacist from Maryland, two law enforcement officials told CNN.
The gunman entered the museum at 12:50 p.m. with a rifle and immediately shot a museum security guard, said Chief Cathy Lanier of the District of Columbia’s Metropolitan Police Department. Two other security guards returned fire, wounding the gunman, she said.
Both the gunman and a security guard were taken to George Washington University Hospital, where the gunman was in “critical” condition and the security guard in “grave” condition, said D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty. Neither Lanier nor Fenty would identify the gunman or the wounded security guard.
Emergency vehicles converged on the area, which is near the Washington Monument and other popular tourist attractions. The museum was full at the time, with a “couple of thousand” people inside, said William Parsons, the chief of staff.
“Never take your guard force and security people for granted,” Parsons said. “They did exactly what they were supposed to do to protect people in the museum.”
An FBI official said there was no prior warning or threat against the museum. In a later statement, the FBI said members of its National Capital Response Squad and Joint Terrorism Task Force are taking part in the investigation.
Lanier said the area around the museum was checked by bomb-sniffing dogs as a matter of routine.
President Obama was made aware of the incident, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters.
“I walked in and I told him there had been a shooting at the museum,” Gibbs said, adding that Obama was “obviously concerned for the security guard that appears to have been hurt … obviously saddened by what has happened.” See where the museum is located »
A witness, who identified herself as 19-year-old Maria without providing a last name, told CNN she heard five shots and saw a security guard lying wounded on the ground.
“It was definitely a security guard, he was down bleeding on the floor,” she said. “He was face down. His back … blood was coming out.”Video Watch Maria describe what she saw »
Dave Pearson, a sixth-grade teacher in the Washington area, said he was on the museum’s fourth floor when he heard a loud noise.
“At the time, we’re visiting and all of a sudden there’s like a boom, and all of a sudden they told us to stop where we’re at,” he told CNN’s Ed Henry.
“Only thing we heard was a boom, and that was it.” Video Watch another museum visitor tell what he saw »
A woman who did not give her name said she understood the shooting happened inside the museum near the security checkpoint at the entrance.
She said she was quickly evacuated.
“We did see yellow tape down the hall when we were being rushed out,” she said. “They came in and said we had to leave right away, and they got us out.”
The museum was closed for the rest of the day, and the museum statement said: “Our thoughts and prayers go out to the officer and his family.”
88-year-old gunman? He should have been playing bingo, not murdering innocent people. Such is the power of anti-Semitism.
Updates (Israel time; most recent at top)
12:06PM: The murdered hero (hat tip: Yid with Lid)
11:45PM: The security guard killed today was 39-year-old Stephen Tyrone Johns.
In a statement released late Wednesday afternoon to museum employees, museum officials said Johns had been a security officer there for six years. They said the Holocaust Museum would be closed on Thursday in his honor, and flags would be flown at half staff.
May G-d comfort his family and avenge his blood.
11:40PM: NBC report on the shooting.
11:38PM: Here is more on the suspected murderer, according to his website.
James W. von Brunn holds a BachSci Journalism degree from a mid-Western university where he was president of SAE and played varsity football.
During WWII he served as PT-Boat captain, Lt. USNR, receiving a Commendation and four battle stars. For twenty years he was an advertising executive and film-producer in New York City. He is a member of Mensa, the high-IQ society.
In 1981 Von Brunn attempted to place the treasonous Federal Reserve Board of Governors under legal, non-violent, citizens arrest. He was tried in a Washington, D.C. Superior Court; convicted by a Negro jury, Jew/Negro attorneys, and sentenced to prison for eleven years by a Jew judge. A Jew/Negro/White Court of Appeals denied his appeal. He served 6.5 years in federal prison. (Read about von Brunn’s “Federal Reserve Caper” HERE.) He is now an artist and author and lives on Maryland’s Eastern Shore.
11:26PM: Tragically, since this report, the security guard died.
