Gunman kills one in Florida rampage

Published: 8:38AM Saturday November 07, 2009 Source: Reuters

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An ex-employee of an engineering consulting firm who was laid off in 2007 has opened fire at his former workplace in Orlando, Florida, killing one person and wounding five others.
   
Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer and Police Chief Val Demmings say the suspect, who fled the Gateway Center building in downtown Orlando after the incident, was later apprehended at his mother's home.
 
"There is one confirmed fatality," Demmings says.

Local media had earlier reported two people killed in the shooting.

The shooting, coming a day after a mass shooting at a US army base in Texas which killed 13 people, caused panic in and around the Orlando office building as armed police moved in and evacuated workers. 
 
Orlando police say the 40-year-old suspect was a former employee at the office of an engineering and architecture company in the building who had returned to the location and started firing.     

They have named him as Jason Rodriguez.

A company spokesperson says he had worked for 11 months as an engineer at the Orlando office of the Reynolds, Smith & Hill consulting company before being laid off for "deficient" performance.

CNN has screened footage of Rodriguez being led away in handcuffs, and says he replied "They left me to rot", when asked by reporters why he had opened fire.

    

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