Welcome committeeMILWAUKEE -- So, earlier this week I picked up the 6 pm to Midnight shift at
work. I'm expecting a quiet Saturday night. Except...(courtesy AP)
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Man kills seven, then himself at church meeting in suburban Milwaukee hotel
Eds: LEADS with 9 grafs to ADD witness description
AP Photos WIMIL101-104, WIMG101-104
By RYAN NAKASHIMA
Associated Press Writer
BROOKFIELD, Wis. (AP) -- A gunman opened fire Saturday during a church service held at a busy suburban Milwaukee hotel, killing seven people and seriously wounding four others.
The gunman apparently killed himself, Brookfield Police Chief Daniel Tushaus said.
"He had planned to shoot us all," a woman who was at the church service said. "I'm asking myself why am I still alive."
Officers found four people and the gunman dead when they arrived about 1 p.m., and three others died later at a hospital, Tushaus said.
Police were not seeking any other suspects in the shooting, which occurred during a regularly scheduled meeting of the Living Church of God at the Sheraton hotel in Brookfield, a western Milwaukee suburb, Tushaus said.
The woman who was at the service, who declined to give reporters her full name, said the gunman started shooting shortly after the service started. She said he had three clips and even stopped to reload.
The woman said she was sitting in front of a "family he mowed down"
"It was mayhem," she told reporters outside the hotel. "I dove under a chair, the man whose chair I dove under died."
The woman said the church's minister was among the dead.
The victims were all in the same meeting room at the hotel, Tushaus said. The suspect, a man of about 45 who was armed with a handgun, was affiliated with the church, which had been meeting at the hotel every Saturday morning for four or five years, he said.
Tushaus didn't identify the victims but gave approximate ages. He said two boys ages 15 and 17, a 72-year-old man and a 55-year-old woman died at the hotel. Three men, ages 58, 50 and 44, died later at a hospital.
Four others -- a 52-year-old woman, a 20-year-old woman, a 20-year-old man and a 10-year-old girl -- were in serious condition at Froedtert Memorial Lutheran Hospital in Wauwatosa and Children's Hospital of Wisconsin.
People at the hotel flooded Waukesha County's emergency dispatch center with 911 calls after the shooting, County Executive Dan Finley said.
Some hotel guests remained locked in their rooms after police surrounded the building and would not allow anyone to enter or leave. Emergency vehicles filled the parking lot at the hotel, located near an interstate and a shopping mall, and police removed a Toyota pickup truck from the lot.
Later Saturday evening, investigators blocked off a block about two miles from the hotel in the neighboring community of New Berlin, where police went in and out of a brown, two-story house near the end of the block.
New Berlin Mayor Telesfore Wysocki said police told him the gunman lived in that neighborhood with his mother and sister, whom officers were interviewing. Wysocki said he didn't know anything else about the suspect.
He said police were collecting more evidence at the man's house.
"We are in total shock and disbelief," he said.
The Living Church of God is headquartered in Charlotte, N.C.
"We really don't have a comment at this time. We don't even know all that has gone on, but it's devastating," said Lara Prejean, a church member who lives in Monroe, N.C.
According to the global church's statement of "fundamental beliefs," the church is a born-again denomination that believes in the end time, followed by Christ's second coming.
Investigators said they would not release any more information about the shooting until a news conference Sunday morning.
"We train for these incidents all the time and we hope against hope they never happen, but today was one of those days," Finley said.
At Froedtert, a team of about 25 doctors, nurses and emergency workers cared for the victims.
"Their actions saved lives in this tragic event here," said Charles Cady, an emergency room doctor.
Matt Z@reczny, 18, of Wauwatosa, was working at the mall when he saw the commotion and went into the hotel. He said he saw one room that was in disarray.
"It just looked like hell in there," he said.
Karen Suick, 48, said she arrived at the hotel Friday night with 15 players and their parents for a hockey tournament.
"One of our hockey dad's two daughters are still in there," she said. "They called his cell phone. They were OK, but they were told to go back to their room. So that's what they did."
Jeff Hietpas, 35, of Fond du Lac, said he thought the shooting happened near his hotel room but he was at a hockey game when it happened.
"I don't know what the hell would have happened if we were there," he said.
Hietpas said his group still planned to stay at the hotel Saturday night.
"We are going to play risk management," Hietpas said.
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Associated Press writers Carrie Antlfinger in New Berlin, Juliet Williams in Wauwatosa, Xiao Zhang in Milwaukee and Michael Felberbaum in Raleigh, N.C. contributed to this report.
(Copyright 2005 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
APTV-03-12-05 1930CST
