Louisville shooter texted friend he'd "shoot up bank"

[notoriousmkg]

I guess this happened this morning.  At least 4 people dead.  Not including the shooter.  

Here is what struck me besides the usual thing where we can't get any kind of gun control:

It sounds like he walked into a regularly scheduled management meeting and then opened fire, like shooting fish in a barrel. 

On one level, we need to realize there has to be a protocol for workplaces when someone has been let go under adverse/contentious conditions.  First of all - no in-person management meetings for the next couple of weeks.  Have people sit at their own desk and do Teams or Zoom until some recognized cooling-off period occurs.

This is also the second time that a friend was tipped off that the shooter was going to do something horrific.  I'm sorry, but you need to make someone a mandatory reporter under those conditions.


www.mirror.co.uk/news/us-news/breaking-louisville-shooter-connor-sturgeon-29675499


An evil gunman who opened fire in a Louisville bank earlier today has been identified as angry 23-year-old former employee Connor Sturgeon who opened fire on his colleagues.



The shooter was live streaming the massacre on Instagram, police have confirmed.

Five people were killed, including the shooter, with nine being taken to hospital for treatment. The four deceased victims were identified as Joshua Barrick, 40, Thomas Elliot, 63, Juliana Farmer, 45, and James Tutt, 64.



Louisville Metropolitan Police Department identified the suspect as Connor Sturgeon, a 23-year-old bank employee at Old National Bank.



Police Chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel said the 23-year-old fired at responding officers, who returned fire to “stop that threat”.



Sturgeon joined the bank full-time in 2021 after three consecutive summer internships.


Police also clarified that the suspect was killed by police and not from a self-inflicted wound and released the name of the officer who stopped him.



Officer Nickolas Wilt, 26, was a new officer to the LMPD and had just graduated and was recently sworn in.

He suffered a gunshot in the head and is hospitalised in critical condition.



LMPD said the suspect shot 13 people including two officers. Six people are still in the hospital. Of those, three are in critical condition, and three are not. Three more people have been treated and were released.



Two of the injured were rushed to the hospital in critical condition, including one police officer. The shooter has been provisionally identified as 23-year-old Sturgeon - a former employee at the Old National Bank who it is reported had just been let go by the bank.



There are multiple reports online of the young banker reportedly telling a friend he was feeling suicidal and would "shoot up the bank".

[trixie]

I don't know, Mo. What defines adverse/contentious conditions? Pretty much anytime anyone is let go, and we don't know the circumstances here, except he'd been employed there for 2 years with a history of 3 summer internships prior to that. So was there any indication of mental instability before or when they fired him? Should businesses put offices on lockdown after they fire anyone?

As for the friend, it would have been great if he had notified the authorities but my guess would be he didn't take the guy seriously. We're talking kids in their early 20s here.

[notoriousmkg]

Apr 10, 2023 21:32:09 GMT trixie said:

I don't know, Mo. What defines adverse/contentious conditions? Pretty much anytime anyone is let go, and we don't know the circumstances here, except he'd been employed there for 2 years with a history of 3 summer internships prior to that. So was there any indication of mental instability before or when they fired him? Should businesses put offices on lockdown after they fire anyone?

As for the friend, it would have been great if he had notified the authorities but my guess would be he didn't take the guy seriously. We're talking kids in their early 20s here.

Apparently, he suffered multiple TBI as a high school or college athlete.  Someone said in the last year of his playing, he even had to wear a helmet.  Apparently, he sent some kind of suicide/homicide note to both his friends and relatives.  His parents would have known exactly where he worked since he had interned there 3 years.  This job, that he was on notice he was being fired from - was all he had known as a real job.  It seems like there were lots of warning signs/risk factors.

But yes, I'm saying any time someone leaves the company involuntarily, and who fits a profile, they need to have protocols.  Personally, for self preservation, I wouldn't be be caught in a conference room with upper management within a couple weeks of a firing like this.  Especially one that is very well known to meet at that place and time.  What I thought I had also read was that he was showing up to BE fired.  If that's true, they would have been lining up like ducks for someone who had a grievance.

More than 20 years ago, I had a subordinate who I had just verbally disciplined bring a hand gun in to work.  He thought he was being funny.  The protocol then was to have me immediately leave work, have the police show up and confiscate the gun.  Then, he was fired on the spot.  For the next 2 weeks, I was personally escorted from my car to the building in the morning, and the building to my car again at the end of the day.  I gave up my window office.  I shut the blinds and window shades in my house at night.  Supposedly, there is a period where someone is more likely to act out.  And even a day of the week that is best to fire someone.  All these years later, I still have dreams about him.

[dilligaf]

I live near this shooting. I am in a state of semi shock today.

He was a very very privileged young man, 25,father is a teacher locally of a high school, former college coach; he was a star athlete, he was supposedly popular, he was privileged enough to get college degree and bank job. Purchased the gun last week legally. (it is Kentucky of course he did). There are conflicting local reports as to whether he was actually fired or not. His mother and brother were actually at the bank but they were too late. Everyone he messaged yesterday reported.

I was surfing Reddit at work when it happened/shortly there after, and got to peruse the shooters Reddit posts-Nearly every single post was Pokemon, gaming related, he liked the Dallas Mavericks, or wholesome memes, etc. (link to his reddit posts in archive format: ( archive.fo/GCwiM )The very very few liberal leaning insta screenshots going around must have been all they could find because it was nothing but Pokemon, and video game posts, sports... It was scrubbed by lunch time. There is a masskillers sub reddit with a lot of info including local accounts.

Locals have shared videos of the scene, in which you can hear many shots being fired, and an officer shouts there is an active shooter and to get out of the vehicle. Chilling, I feel so strange today, I have walked downtown Louisville so many times, used to live in this city!!!!! I was never scared, but since Breonna Taylor and now this nightmare, I fear downtown will be a ghost town. I just want to go home where I feel safe. I have never carried my gun, I just keep it at home, and I carry an 8 inch survival knife for my daily weapon. Would I as an old out of shape aging woman be safer carrying a gun? Would I even feel safer? My size, my lack of fear, my loud mouth, and my rage have kept me safe thus far, but even Arnold S would not be able to fight an automatic weapon!!!!!! I do not want to live in fear!!!!!!

The shooter live streamed the shooting, Louisville police have confirmed, and the entire shooting apparently took place with in a minute. As hard as I have searched (even 4 Chan) I cannot locate the video. Police body cams are going to be released as well.

There was a bunch of nonsense by Trumpies claiming that he had pronouns on his Linkd In profile. Then other Trumpies and I guess Liberal Nutbags tried to claim the pronouns had been photo shopped in, which seems to be the most popular tale going around (photoshopped). No it is not photoshopped. These dumbasses online were clicking on his profile without their own Linkd Account/without being logged in, and when you actually log in the pronoun are there. But the rumor still swirls that somehow someone photoshopped them in to promote an agenda. NO THEY DID NOT. The only agenda was this sicko murderer's twisted selfish exit plan!! (literally only mentioning because of the false rumor, not as an opinion on pronouns btw). It is quite disturbing because many many places are just running with the photshop lie, and its no wonder we cannot barely trust journalism/media any longer.

My opinion on mass shootings/shooters is quite unpopular. It is not a gun problem, the common denominator is not the gun, it is the sex of the shooter. Out of the 172 American Mass Murder Shootings since the early eighties, only 4 were female, 2 of those females working in concert with a male, one pumped full of testosterone possibly (I believe the Nashville shooter MAY have been sex abused by clergy from my deep dive but never confirmed), and Brenda Spencer was a 16 year old mass shooter who had been sexually abused by her father. Women rarely carry out mass shootings. The problem is not the guns, it is violent men. Control the violent men, and there will cease to be a "gun control problem". I feel gaslighted when people start crying about common denominator is the gun, no it isn't the main common denominator!! But no one wants to discuss this!!!! It is much easier to cry, toss some tots and pears, and demand "gun control", before settling in to watch Yellowstone or Survivor and moving on to the next tragedy du jour.

Connor Sturgeon had every damn advantage a human being can have including white male privilege, and he still had to kill innocent bystanders, cowardly violent man. He can rot in hell with all of the other violent men ever born.

Sorry so worked up not trying to be offensive!!!!!!!!!

ETA I am sorry that happened to you Mo how scary!!!!

[sputnik]

i agree the common denominator is men, i don't think that's necessarily an unpopular opinion but where do you go from there in terms of finding a solution? that's where gun control comes in. you can't get rid of men so the next best thing you can do is make it really hard for them to get their hands on guns.
australia is a prime example. they made it almost impossible for anyone to get a gun and as a result, violent shootings were pretty much wiped out. these violent attacks might happen but they'll be carried out with a knife or a sword so while still awful, there will be less damage and it is easier for bystanders to neutralize the attacker than if he's armed with a gun.

and mo, that's terrifying. and i can see why you think companies should take measures but i kind of agree with trixie, that would be almost impossible to implement. pretty much any time someone gets laid off it's potentially contentious, how would you determine who fits the profile? someone could easily not react in the moment and then come back with an arsenal and shoot the place up. 

[notoriousmkg]

Apr 11, 2023 23:25:39 GMT sputnik said:

and mo, that's terrifying. and i can see why you think companies should take measures but i kind of agree with trixie, that would be almost impossible to implement. pretty much any time someone gets laid off it's potentially contentious, how would you determine who fits the profile? someone could easily not react in the moment and then come back with an arsenal and shoot the place up. 

Can't we ask ChatGPT???  They seem to have all the answers!  But seriously, I just don't think enough thought is given to this.  I'm telling you right now that 10 times as much thought is given to the hiring process as to the termination process.  Except maybe for decommissioning your proximity card and the termination of access rights to the corporate network.  One thing about my company - everyone is really diffusely distributed around the building.  It would be a really low-yield situation if someone came in with a gun.

Definitely more men than women are shooters.  However, one of the San Bernardino shooters (husband and wife) was a woman.  One of the craziest workplace shootings I had heard about in the past 20 years was a woman who was coming in for a review for why she wasn't getting tenure.  She brought in a pistol and killed the three people meeting with her.

But it is also the gun.  Pretty much 9 times out of 10 in one of these mass shootings, the person is wielding an AR-15 rifle.  Uvalde, Highland Park, Newton/Sandy Hook, Dayton (100-round clip).  The only difference between an AR-15 and a military-use M-16 is that the M-16 is fully automatic.  The gun (and others like it) should be banned nation-wide and if you have one in your possession after like January 1, 2024, you are committing a felony.  There are 20 million AR-15 guns in American hands.  Think about that.  Could probably make a World Trade Center tower out of that crap.

[panic]

I think it is the gun. If I look at how many other developed countries restricted gun laws after mass shootings over there and how gun violence has since declined in those countries, I have to conclude the gun is the common denominator. The US stands apart with the level of gun violence because so many refuse to see what other countries have already figured out.

[dilligaf]

The Body Cam Footage was released. One officer was shot in the head. He was 12 days on the job fresh out of academy, heartbreaking to watch his footage.

WARNING. DO NOT WATCH if you are sensitive to violence, blood, and a lot of shooting, they show his dead body albeit half blurred. The very first part got me, knowing this was a rookie kid.

youtu.be/xQUK7UyF8uE

[trixie]

I think it's both the men (and small percentage of women) AND the gun. I would like to know ANY reason why ANYONE can buy an AR-15 or AK-47 or whatever they are using. You might always have disgruntled, suicidal, homicidal, mentally ill people in society but in the US, we're just handing these guns out to anyone who wants to buy one. Making it easy for them to act out their murderous fantasies.

From what little I've heard about this guy, he doesn't fit the usual profile of the loner incel kid living in his mom's basement which is actually even scarier.

At the last large corporation I worked at, there was always restructuring, downsizing, etc. When the HR person showed up (we called her the Angel of Death lol) everyone was a little nervous. During the downsizing, their policy was to call a person into an office, inform them they were being let go, take their employee badge, hand them a box to go to their desk and collect their things, and escort them out the door. They were given severances, but how damn cold and humiliating to have to do this in front of all your (now former) co-workers. There was security at corporate, but not at the smaller branches, so if it happened in my office, theoretically, anyone could walk in a week later and shoot up the place.

[sputnik]

oh, it's definitely men




but the only thing that truly explains the difference between the US and other countries is the US' gun culture and access to guns, and i agree that access to semi-automatic weapons, and accessories that basically transform them into fully automatic and make a mockery of the supposed ban on automatic weapons. it is delusional to think guns aren't at the center of the issue. 

[dilligaf]

Another thing I noticed while reading yesterday.

The mass murders in America seem to have tripled after 2000, compared to the two decades before. The internet also became a house hold thing around the same time period. Separate from men, I think the internet has had a huge influence on these murdering nutbags. They know in death and infamy the will be eternal.

[albatross]

Apr 12, 2023 23:48:34 GMT dilligaf said:

Another thing I noticed while reading yesterday.

The mass murders in America seem to have tripled after 2000, compared to the two decades before. The internet also became a house hold thing around the same time period. Separate from men, I think the internet has had a huge influence on these murdering nutbags. They know in death and infamy the will be eternal.

I think the internet plays a part, but I think it has more to do with the fact that the internet provides an absolutely huge echo chamber.

It is so easy to go online and get validation for any ideas you have, no matter how stupid, dangerous, etc. those ideas may be. You're not challenged about your thinking. Social media feeds into that by using algorithms that show you what you want to see. Lies are presented on pretty, eye-catching web sites, and it takes effort to distinguish fact from fiction, and if you're determined to believe the fiction, then there are more than enough idiots out there telling you it's true.

The internet makes it easy to fan the flames of hate and to encourage violence. In addition to the 'true believers', you have people that are fanning the flames for their own amusement because there aren't any consequences for what they post.

[funky]

^ I agree albatross. You will always find like-minded people, however stupid or downright dangerous your ideas are. There are pages and groups dedicated to praise mass-murderers, shooters, you name it.

[sputnik]

but all of that - the echo chambers, the toxic masculinity, the violence - would have a much, much lower death toll if access to guns, and especially semi-automatic guns, wasn't so fucking easy that any mentally ill domestic abuser can amass a fucking arsenal without setting off any red flags anywhere. you can't kill as many people with a gun, or even a regular hunting rifle, and i bet 3/4 of these guys wouldn't do this if they didn't have their semi-automatic and their body armour that lets them do way, way more damage before anyone can stop them.

[notoriousmkg]

Another incredibly disturbing trend is that these losers put some kind of GoPro on their heads and then livestream their rampage. We first saw it with the guy who killed the reporter and camera man who were doing a live report on some dock somewhere. And this is at least the third I can think of. The result being that the relatives have to live not only with the horrific loss, but the fear that some toxic loser will post it somewhere or even email it to them.

But the Internet allows "Safe" spaces for demented people who previously would have been all alone with their thoughts and nobody else to validate their feelings or bounce apocalyptic ideas off of.