Here’s what we know about the San Jose rail yard shooting
Investigators are trying to determine what led a gunman to open fire Wednesday at his workplace — a public transit rail yard in San Jose, California — killing nine people before killing himself, officials said.
Eight miles away, authorities are looking into the gunman’s home, which officials said was burning around the time of the shooting.
Here’s what we know:
The shooting took place during shift change
Authorities received 911 calls at 6:34 a.m. PT regarding the gunfire at a Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) rail yard, Santa Clara County Sheriff Laurie Smith said.
The gunman, a VTA employee, shot colleagues in two buildings around the time of a morning shift change before taking his own life in front of responding law enforcement officers, authorities have said. He fired 39 rounds, Smith said.
A spokesman for the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s department said authorities recovered three handguns carried by the gunman, who had 11 magazines on him when he opened fire in the VTA facility.
The VTA is a public transit service that operates bus and light rail services in the Santa Clara Valley and employs about 2,000 workers. The rail yard is where the VTA vehicles are maintained and dispatched.
Deputies and other law enforcement officers arrived as the shooting continued, within two minutes of the calls, as the sheriff’s office has a station nearby. They confronted the gunman on a building’s third floor within six minutes, Smith told CNN.
The gunman “took his own life in front of the deputies,” Smith told CNN. She said she believes the law enforcement officers’ quick response saved many lives.
Deputies did not exchange gunfire with the shooter, county sheriff’s Deputy Russell Davis said.
The gunman bypassed certain people during the shooting, and so appeared to select those he shot, a witness said.
“He … was targeting certain people. He walked by other people,” Kirk Bertolet, a worker at the VTA in San Jose, told CNN affiliate KGO. “He let other people live as he gunned down other people.”
Smith, the sheriff, wasn’t sure Thursday morning whether the gunman had specific targets in mind, she told CNN.
“I have heard those things, (but) I haven’t heard them officially, so I’m not sure that he targeted certain individuals,” Smith said.
Bomb-sniffing dogs eventually alerted investigators to the gunman’s locker at work. In the locker, investigators found “precursor things for explosives … ingredients for a device,” Smith said Thursday. That included detonation pulls, she said.
Smith didn’t know why the items were there or what the gunman might have intended for them, she said.
The gunman resented his workplace
The gunman has been identified as Sam Cassidy, a source close to the investigation told CNN.
“They were handguns of the type that would be legal in California,” Smith said, adding she didn’t know how or when the gunman obtained the weapons.
The guns were not considered to be untraceable “ghost guns,” Santa Clara County District Attorney Jeff Rosen said.
US Customs and Border Protection officers detained Cassidy in 2016, and he was found with “books about terrorism and fear and manifestos… as well as a black memo book filled with lots of notes about how he hates the VTA,” according to The Wall Street Journal, which cited a Department of Homeland Security memo.
“When asked if he had problems with anybody at work, he stated ‘no,'” according to the memo, a copy of which The Wall Street Journal said it had viewed.
Cassidy’s ex-wife, Cecilia Nelms, told CNN affiliate the Bay Area News Group he resented his work. Nelms was married to Cassidy for about 10 years until the couple filed for divorce in 2005. She has not been in touch with her ex-husband for about 13 years, according to the outlet.
He often spoke angrily about his coworkers and bosses and at times directed his anger at her, Nelms told the outlet.
When the two were married, Cassidy “resented what he saw as unfair work assignments” and “would rant about his job when he got home.”
Cassidy also had a strained relationship with an ex-girlfriend, show court documents that revealed troubling allegations she made in a filing in 2009 as she responded to a restraining order he filed against her.
The woman says she dated Cassidy for about one year in what she said became an off-and-on-again relationship after about six months.
She described Cassidy as having mood swings that were “exacerbated when (Cassidy) consumed large quantities of alcohol,” she said in the court document, and she alleged he had bipolar disorder.
She said he enjoyed playing mind games with her, according to the court document.
“Several times during the relationship he became intoxicated, enraged and forced himself on me sexually,” said the former girlfriend, who CNN is not naming and is reaching out to for comment.
The victims were VTA employees
Each person shot by the gunman died, Smith said. They died either at the scene or, in the case of at least two victims, at a hospital, Smith said. Glenn Hendricks, chairman of the VTA, said all were VTA employees.
The Santa Clara County medical examiner’s office identified the victims, whose ages ranged from 29 to 63:
• Abdolvahab Alaghmandan, 63, worked with VTA for 20 years as a substation maintainer
• Adrian Balleza, 29, started as a bus operator trainee in 2014 and later a maintenance worker and light rail operator
• Alex Ward Fritch, 49, a substation maintainer
• Jose Dejesus Hernandez III, 35, started in 2012 as a transit mechanic then became electro-mechanic, then substation maintainer
• Lars Kepler Lane, 63, started in 2001 as eletro-mechanic, later became an overhead line worker
• Paul Delacruz Megia, 42, started in 2002 as bus operator trainee, later light rail operator, transportation supervisor, transit division supervisor, assistant superintendent in service management
• Timothy Michael Romo, 49, served over 20 years as an overhead line worker
• Michael Joseph Rudometkin, 40, started in 2013 as mechanic, later electro- mechanic, and then overhead line worker
• Taptejdeep Singh, 36, started in 2014 as bus operator trainee, later light rail operator
“It’s clear the victims and all the colleagues knew the shooter well,” San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo told CNN.
Liccardo described the victims as “essential workers” who risked their lives and showed up every day throughout the pandemic.
Some of the victims are related to members of the sheriff’s office, Smith said.
Gunman’s home went up in flames
Several scenes are connected to the investigation into the shooting, San Jose fire department spokeswoman Erica Ray said.
Minutes after the 911 calls about the shooting began, firefighters were called to a fire at the suspect’s home in San Jose, Smith, the sheriff, told CNN on Thursday morning. It’s not immediately clear how that fire started.
No one was found inside, Liccardo told CNN affiliate KGO. The home is about eight miles from the site of the shooting, the mayor said.
Firefighters responded to a fire at the home in the 1100 block of Angmar Court in San Jose at 6:36 a.m. local time, according to tweets from the San Jose fire department.
It took firefighters about an hour to extinguish the flames, which caused heavy damage to the home and left the structure uninhabitable, the fire department said.
Surveillance video obtained by CNN shows a man leaving the home of the shooting suspect on Wednesday morning with a duffle bag.
A neighbor, who did not want to be identified, said the video was captured around 5:40 a.m. and showed Cassidy leaving the house in a truck. The neighbor described Cassidy as a “quiet” and “strange” man.
CNN has reached out to the sheriff’s office to see if investigators are aware of and have seen this video.
Investigators have found ammunition and “a lot more” at the house, said Smith, who didn’t go into detail about the materials found there.
The FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) are assisting the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office with the investigation.
The FBI is helping with evidence, response and recovery, according to Craig Fair, special agent in charge of the San Francisco division of the FBI. The agency will provide ballistics, technical forensic equipment and analysis, along with additional personnel to help analyze the “very sizable crime scene,” Fair said.
The ATF has brought in five bomb-sniffing dogs to assist in the search for any potential explosives. The agency is also providing investigative resources to trace firearms and ballistics evidence in an effort to link it to other firearm crimes that might be involved, said Joshua Jackson, ATF special agent in charge.
