At least two killed at California college shooting—reports
OAKLAND, California—At least two people were killed and a number injured Monday at a private religious college near San Francisco, local media reported, while police said a suspected gunman had been arrested.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported that four bodies were covered with tarps outside the Oikos University in East Oakland, citing a witness as saying a student who always “looked crazy” stood up in a class and started shooting.
At least four people were killed, according to the Contra Costa Times, while the Chronicle said at least two people had been killed and six injured, adding that a local hospital was treating four victims from the shooting.
“A gunman came into the college and fired multiple shots,” an Oakland police spokeswoman said. “We do have fatalities. I cannot confirm the number of fatalities we have at this time.”
Initially police warned that a suspect, described as Korean and in his 40s, was at large, but a short time later, the Oakland Police Department said on Twitter that they had a “possible suspect in custody.”
“No imminent public safety threat appears to exist in immediate area,” it added.
Police and SWAT teams took position around the building, some smashing glass with sledgehammers and rushing inside as officers helped students evacuate the campus, the Chronicle reported.
Angie Johnson, 52, said she saw a young woman leaving the building with blood coming from her arm and crying, “I’ve been shot, I’ve been shot.”
The woman said the shooter was a man in her nursing class who rose up and shot one person at point blank range in the chest before he started spraying the room with bullets, Johnson said, cited by the Chronicle.
“She said he looked crazy all the time,” Johnson said the victim told her. “But they never knew how far he would go.”
The victim “had a hole in her right arm the size of a silver dollar with blood coming down,” she added.
Five ambulances were dispatched to a “multi-patient medical scene,” the Oakland Fire Department said on its Twitter feed, citing reports of “multiple stabbing/gunshot victims.”
The Oakland Police Department had tweeted that the suspect was “male, Asian, heavy build, khaki clothing, near or in area.”
The school says on its website that it strives to “provide highest standard education with Christian value and inspiration.”
“Oikos University has a very specific goal and mission to offer education programs in the area of religious studies, music, and vocational nursing,” it said.
“We motivate, educate and equip students in such a way that they will be able to live enriched life by fulfilling their goals in life and serve the community with their learned professions and skills,” it added.
