Soccer Dad: Shootings at city hall

February 8, 2008

Shootings at city hall

I saw this terrible news out of Missouri:

A man known for confrontations with city officials killed five people at a city council meeting in suburban St. Louis Thursday night before he was shot to death by police.

Two Kirkwood police officers and three people attending the meeting were killed by the gunman, who rushed the council chambers and began firing as he yelled "Shoot the mayor!" according to St. Louis County Police spokesman Tracy Panus.

Two others were wounded, including Mayor Mike Swoboda. Two council members reportedly were shot, but it was not clear if they had been killed.

It reminded me of this incident from 1976:

April 13 represented the 30th anniversary of the darkest day in Baltimore City Council�s history. On that date in 1976, 35-year-old local restaurateur Charles A. Hopkins went on a rampage in City Hall, shooting and killing Councilman Dominic M. Leone and wounding several others. As a result of the attack, Councilman J. Joseph Curran Sr. suffered a heart attack, which ultimately claimed his life 11 months later.
...
��How can I help you, fella?�� Slain Councilman Dominic M. Leone�s last words before being viciously gunned down by Hopkins, as recounted by Councilwoman Mary Pat Clarke (D-14th District) prior to a moment of silence in honor of the 30th anniversary of the shootings.

There's more here.

When I was looking for information about the shooting at the Baltimore's City Hall I came across some other interesting tidbits:

1904 Mayor Robert M. McLane, Mayor of Baltimore, shoots himself (or was shot) to death in his home at 29 W. Preston Street. The death officially was ruled a suicide. The mayor had seemed depressed about the fire's destruction of his city. Yet he had just returned with his wife from a pleasant lunch engagement. Some believe that the mayor's wife shot her husband to death. The young mayor (born 1867) was a newlywed at the time of his death. He had married Mary Van Bibber on May l4, 1904, two scant weeks before the fatal shot was fired. The shooting occurred May 30, 1904. Mayor McLane is buried in Greenmount Cemetery. An ongoing Baltimore mystery.

I believe that Greenmount Cemetery is also the final resting place of Edgar Allan Poe.

And there was another shooting at Baltimore's City Hall 19th century too.

James F. Busey a Democratic ward heeler of the lowest type, but a man who has political influence enough in this city to carry the Seventeenth Ward around in his vest pocket, was shot and mortally wounded in front of the City Hall before noon to-day.

city government, crime, baltimore.