An Asian man is responsible for Binghamton, NY shooting

[King Henry]

A 42-year-old Vietnamese man named Linh Phat Voong, who was sometimes called by his nickname Jiverly Voong, opened fire in a Binghamton community center that caters to immigrants. Fourteen people, including the gunman, died. At least four others are in critical condition. It's being reported that as many as 26 are wounded. Most of those who died or were injured were in one classroom taking a citizenship exam. Voong had backed his car up to the back entrance to prevent anyone from escaping. He then proceeded to the front of the building.

The police did not mention a motive, but it's known that Voong was laid off from his job at IBM in nearby Johnson City, New York.

The man entered the American Civic Association building at 10:31 this morning and shot two receptionists, one died immediately. The other pretended to be dead. She then crawled under a desk and called 911.

Zhanar Tokhtabayeva, a 30-year-old from Kazakhstan, was in an English class when she heard a shot fired. Her teacher screamed for everyone to go to the storage room. 26 other people hid in a boiler room and 37 were safely removed from the building.

"I heard the shots, every shot. I heard no screams, just silence, shooting," Tokhtabayeva said. "I heard shooting, very long time ... and I was thinking, when will this stop? I was thinking that my life was finished."

By 10:33, the shooting was over. Voong's body was later found with a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. He was armed with a 9mm pistol and a .45 caliber handgun. He also carried a survival knife and flashlight.

President Obama issued a statement from the NATO summit he was attending in France.

"Michelle and I were shocked and deeply saddened to learn about the act of senseless violence in Binghamton, N.Y., today. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the victims, their families and the people of Binghamton," he said.

Binghamton is a small town in northern New York state that has approximately 47,000 residents. New York Gov. David Paterson called the shooting "the worst tragedy and senseless crime in the history of the city."

"We all just have profound sorrow and sadness," he said.

This is a developing story and more information will be provided once it is available.  

[Wanari]

Aw, How sad. I hope that everything goes well with the families who have lost or have injures victim in this. I wonder why he didn't just bring a partner and they could be shooting everywhere! 8D Sounds perfect, I am totally going to try it and die in the process. JK! rolleyes I am not that insane to that such a thing as that. rofl Though in my head it reply on how it would go down..  

[King Henry]

The police are now saying that his name was Jiverly Wong, not Voong. This might mean he was not of Vietnamese descent, as reported earlier.

The New York Times also has this to say:

"Updated | 7:05 p.m. There seems to be a mix-up about the alleged shooter, whose name police are still not releasing.

Representative Maurice Hinchey, whose district includes Binghamton, had told the New York Times and the Associated Press that the alleged shooter had been laid off from I.B.M. But a person familiar with the I.B.M. plant in Johnson City tells us that the alleged shooter did not work for I.B.M.

There is someone with the same last name as the alleged shooter who does contract work at the plant, the person said, but that worker was at the plant all day today and has not been laid off."  

[sea-rover]

i heard this on the news today, really sad.  

[Sesshomaruka]

i herd about this on the news too,
its so scary ><

i was at the mall with my friends, and an hour after we left there was a shooting, my parents freaked at me >__>  

[ShigureAishite]

Ah, shootings. Quite scary things sometimes. My school had a shooting incident thing kind of. Someone put that they would shoot anyone wearing black shirts at school. It spread around and my parents heard of it and the next morning they just said "Be careful at school." I just nodded and rolled my eyes like usual and went to school. It was somewhat nice...empty school and extra credit for showing up. Naturally there was no schoolwork since over 50% of the school was missing. Just once though, it was quiet and peaceful.  

[Kyros_DeLove]

Waaahhh. So scary. >~<" So much violence in the world...D:  

[King Henry]

New developments:



Although Jiverly Wong's (pictured above) sister was utterly shocked when the police called her home and informed her of the massacre, other individuals that knew Wong say they weren't surprised when they heard the news.

"From the people close to him, the actions that he took were not a surprise to them," Chief Joseph Zikuski told reporters at a noon news conference.

The police chief said that "some of this behavior on his part wasn't a total shock," but did not elaborate what, if any, previous behavior he meant. Zikuski said the suspect was heavily armed and that the victims had "multiple gunshot" wounds from yesterday's assault. "He must have been a coward, he decided to end his own life," when he heard police sirens, Zikuski said.

It's been confirmed that Wong was born in Vietnam to an ethnically Chinese family, but had changed his last name to Voong. He immigrated to the United States in the early 1990s. He worked at IBM for a period of time and eventually found a job at the Shop-Vac factory in Binghamton, where he assembled vacuum cleaners for a living. When he was fired from that job, things took a turn for the worse.

"People who end up doing this particular thing have an accumulation of stressers in their lives, and ultimately there is the one that broke the camel's back," Dietz said. "Job loss is one of the big ones, and those stressers are happening more often this year."

Hue Huynh, the owner of an Asian grocery store where Wong's sister would often shop, met up with him at the gym recently. He told her that he couldn't find work. His unemployment benefits totaled just $200 a week and he lamented his poor luck.

"Apparently people were making fun of him. He felt he was being degraded because of his inability to speak English, and he was upset about that," Chief Zikuski said. One time, he even angrily yelled, "I don't like America. America sucks!" at a co-worker.

Wong was enrolled in English language classes at the center, but he dropped out during the first week of March. He wore a bulletproof vest during the shooting, which suggests the attack was premeditated and that he was expecting a confrontation with the police. The four victims that were wounded by him are still in hospital care, but they're all expected to survive.

The gunman's tactics fit him into a category of killers called "pseudo-commandos," said Park Dietz, a criminologist and forensic psychiatrist at UCLA. Dietz has previously analyzed the shootings at Columbine High School, which also took place in the month of April.

Barricading the back entrance to trap his prey "was his way of ensuring that he could maximize his kill rate," Dietz said. "This was all about anger, paranoia, and desperation."

A representative for the American Civic Association read the following statement while trying to hold back tears. "Whatever drove this individual to do what he did I cannot possibly fathom," she said. "But we will come out of our grief and sadness more resolute in our mission and more dedicated than ever to help people realize the dream of American citizenship."

The receptionist who crawled under a desk and called 911, 61-year-old Shirley DeLucia, was shot in the stomach. "[She's a] very brave lady," the police chief said. The woman is among the four wounded victims and she is in serious condition.

In 1999, state police had received a tip from an anonymous source that Wong was planning an armed bank robbery. He apparently had a cocaine addiction.

Wong's father was well-known in the Binghamton area for his work in years past at the now-defunct World Relief Organization. He would assist immigrants in finding doctors and obtaining food stamps.

"Everyone, when they come to America, he's the one who helps," said Ty Tran, a Vietnamese expatriate who arrived in the U.S. in 1990.  

[Rabid Bagel Cow Thing]

My Mom was reading about it and she was just shocked..

So many of these senseless acts of aggression are popping up.

Ah, its a shame that some people feel so cornered and stressed that they'd do this.

I hope the survivors have a speedy recovery...