THE BEHREND BEACON
Gunman shoots 4, killing 2, in Seattle
by Daniel Vasquez
and Brandon Bailey
Knight-Ridder Newspapers
November 04, 1999
SEATTLE A man in camouflage
gear walks into a shipyard office and
shoots four people, killing two, the
day after a disgruntled employee
blows away seven co-workers at a
Xerox repair facility in Honolulu.
Seattle police were still hunting for
the shipyard gunman Wednesday
night. His motive was unknown. And
despite a spate of similar incidents
around the country this year, experts
say they are still the rare exception to
an overall decline in violent crime na
tionwide.
But even as the homicide rate is
dropping, some analysts believe there
has been an uptick in the category of
seemingly random mass shootings.
Experts also say there are common
threads to these terrifying episodes
and perhaps even lessons that can pre
vent them from occurring again."lt's
not that these guys are spontaneous.
They don't suddenly explode," said
criminologist Jack Levin, director of
the Brudnick Center on Violence at
Boston's Northeastern University.
"The truth is these are usually cold
blooded executions. The killer typi
cally sees himself as a victim of in
justice who wants to get even."
By late Wednesday, authorities still
hadn't identified the Seattle gunman,
believed to be in his 20s or 30s, who
walked into a weathered three-story
building on the north shore of Lake
Union around 10:30 a.m.
Witnesses said the man wore a
baseball cap, sunglasses and an over
coat over camouflage clothing. He
didn't say anything as he shot four
men with a 9mm handgun and
then walked away. Police were using
dogs, helicopters, boats and armored
vehicles to search the gritty industrial
and residential neighborhoods near the
Northlake Shipyard building just
a few miles from downtown Seattle.
Public schools in the area were locked
down, as city officials advised resi
dents to stay inside and be careful.
Larry Parrett, 44, left work to check
his house, five blocks from the ship
yard. "I came home to check for bro
ken windows or anything suspicious,"
he said. "My girlfriend wanted me to
stop by because she was afraid to
come home" while the shooter was
still at large. Peter Giles, the
shipyard's 26-year-old manager and
nephew of the owners, was pro
nounced dead at the scene. Russell
James Brisendine, a 43-year-old ma
rine engineer, died in surgery after
being shot three times in the chest and
abdomen. A third victim was in criti
cal condition with a gunshot wound
The Microsoft decision
The Washington Post
It's hard to imagine how the find
ings of fact handed down Friday
evening by U.S. District Judge Tho
mas Penfield Jackson could have
been worse news for Microsoft or
better news for the government's an
titrust enforcers. Judge Jackson de
clared that Microsoft possessed mo
nopoly power in the market for Intel
based personal computer operating
systems, and that the company had
leveraged this power in ways that
harmed competitors and, more im
portant, consumers.
While Friday's ruling did not at
tempt to apply any legal standards to
the facts, the conduct Judge Jackson
contends now has been proven by the
government to, by any reasonable
standard, constitute violations of the
Killer of gay student avoids death penalty
TMS Campus
November 04, 1999
The 22-year-old man convicted of
killing gay college student Matthew
Shepard has avoided the death pen
alty, prosecutors announced Thurs
day.
The judge sentenced Aaron
McKinney, a roofer and high school
WORLD AND NATION
to the chest, while a fourth was treated
for a gunshot wound to the arm.
"This happened to some pretty nice
guys," said Mark Jackson, who rents
space in the shipyard building for his
industrial painting company. lie said
the shootings came "totally out of the
blue. 1 can't imagine two people in an
office can create enough anger in any
body to get shot."
The shootings here came one day af
ter a disgruntled Xerox technician
calmly killed seven people at his work
place in Honolulu the worst mass
murder in Hawaii's modern history.
Byran Uyesugi, 40. later surrendered
to police. Xerox officials say Uyesugi
wasn't having any problems at work.
But family members said Uyesugi, a
15-year employee of the company, had
been ordered to attend anger manage
ment sessions after he threatened a su
pervisor in 1993. Relatives also report
edly said Uyesugi was concerned he
might be getting laid off.
Workplace violence of all kinds has
risen in recent years, according to fed
eral statistics, and Levin said that's es
pecially so for iolence against super
visors or managers. - The number of
bosses or supervisors killed by dis
gruntled workers or ex-workers has
doubled over the past decade," Levin
said. In the Seattle case, witnesses said
they didn't recognize the shooter as an
employee. He could turn out to he a
jealous lover, an angry customer or
even a sloppy hold-up man. But when
robbery or some other crime isn't in
volved, experts say the typical mass
killer is often a middle-aged man who's
antitrust laws
Judge Jackson's ruling seems to
us, in the main, a reasonable reading
of the evidence -- if one that is some-
times too strident and ungenerous to
Microsoft. Indeed, when the record of
the case is aptly summarized, it is hard
to escape the conclusion that
Microsoft's dominant position is
threatening to the health of competi
tion in the software industry.
Judge Jackson's opinion outlines,
first, the evidence that the company
controls an operating system mo
nopoly -- chiefly that it can set prices
without reference to competitors and
that other operating systems control
insignificant market share. This mo
nopoly, the judge held, is protected
by the number of applications that
have been developed for the Windows
platform and the inability of any pu
dropout, to two life sentences to be
served consecutively. Under Wyo
ming law, however, he could've got
ten the death penalty.
McKinney was convicted of mur
der Wednesday in the beating of gay
college student Matthew Shepard by
jurors.
The jury of seven men and five
women rejected the more serious
been accumulating frustrations and
feelings of alienation for years.
"We have this false belief that these
guys suddenly snap or go berserk,"
said James Alan Fox, former dean of
Northeastern University's College of
Criminal Justice. "It takes more than
a single epsode to get to the point that
you're that angry, that depressed, that
you're willing to take the lives of Other
people and sometimes your own
life."
Like Mark Barton. the Atlanta day
trader who killed nine people and him
self last July, or Buford Furrow, the
former Aryan Nations security guard
who killed a postal worker and shot
up a Jewish community center in Los
Angeles last August. Experts say that
such Men Often blame others for their
problems. And sometimes they're in
spired by news reports or even fic
tional accounts of similar events else
where. In one Of the Worst mass
shootings of the decade, George
I lennard killed 23 people at a Luby's
cafeteria in Killeen, Texas, in 1991.
Afterward, according to Levin, police
went to his home and found he'd been
watching a \ ideotaped account of an
earlier mass shooting at a McDonald's
in San Ysidro, south of San Diego.
"There can he a copy cat effect,"
agreed Allred Blumstein, direct o r of
the National Consortium on Violence
Research at Carnegie Mellon Univer
sity.
"The great majority of people who
are exposed to violence in the media
just don't react to it in any serious mat
ter:" he added. "But it only takes a few
tative competitor to succeed in the
market without a similar, pre-exist
ing base of applications.
fudge Jackson then proceeded to
detail the manner in which that mo
nopoly was employed by Microsoft
to stifle perceived threats to the
company's dominance. This conduct
included efforts to persuade Netscape
not to compete for the browser mar
ket on Windows. And, the judge con
cluded that when that effort failed,
Microsoft sought to force other corn
panics to support Microsoft's Internet
Explorer browsing software -- rather
than Netscape's -- as a condition of
cooperation from Microsoft that its
operating system monopoly make es
sential for so many companies. Sig
nificantly, Judge Jackson found that
Microsoft's browser and operating
system were distinct products, inte-
charge of first degree murder, which
involves premeditation. Felony mur
der, or murder committed during a
felony crime, carries a possible death
penalty. Kidnapping and robbery are
felonies.
Shepard was lured last year from
a bar, lashed to a fence, bludgeoned
in the head with a pistol and left to
die on the cold prairie in a case
NOVEMBER 12, 1999
people to react to it. For people who
are right at the edge, a variety of
things are enough to push them
over...
Another factor that makes today's
mass shootings seem worse than
ever is the high casualty rate in
flicted by the greater firepower some
gunmen have brought to bear,
Blumstein said. The typical shooter
has had access to semi-automatic or
automatic weapons that fire rapidly
and come with magazines large
enough to carry numerous rounds.
But even while acknowledging a
statistical increase in random mass
shootings -- as opposed to those
involving robbery or attacks on fam
ily members lflumstein argues
that these are more isolated episodes
than part of a larger societal prob
lem. Fox, the former Northeastern
dean, agreed. If there's been a nu
merical increase. he said, it's not a
strong statistical trend.
"You can't presume that just be
cause we've had several in a clus
ter, that we're going to hell in a
handbasket," Fox added. "We have
more today than we did 30 years
ago, hut we're not in an epidemic."
Still, other experts say there are
enough similarities for society to
confront the issues that may fuel
such violence.
Employers need to he more com
passionate in their handling of work
ers. particularly those who are
troubled or facing termination, said
Robert Baron, a professor of man
agement and psychology at
Rensselaer Polytechnic University
ho has sluchecl N.\ Olki)laCC VlOlenCe
extensiveh
Studies have found many work
ers feel threatened by the increas
ing pace of change in their jobs,
along %1 t h the decline in longterm
job security, Baron said. On a
broader level, Levin said those who
tend toward violence often feel
alienated from their communities
and diStrustful of institutions that are
supposed 10 resol e problems peace
fully such as the courts and so
cial ser \ ice agencies.
"We have to find ways of repair
ing the credihility of our mainstream
institutions," Levin said. As an ex
ample, he suggested that hoth busi
ness and government agencies bring
back human telephone operators --
instead of bewildering voicemail
systems so customers can feel
that someone actually cares about
their complaints. When people who
are already on the margin begin to
feel that no one cares about their
problems, Levin added, some will
turn to more extreme measures to
find relief.
grated for the purposes of squelch
ing competitive threats despite the
fact that the integration harmed
consumers
He also concluded that Microsoft
attacked other companies' innova
tions when it regarded them as po
tential competitors to Windows as
platforms for software develop
ment.
Judge Jackson's opinion should
send a strong message to the com
pany that it would do well to settle
this litigation. The district judge
who sits through a long trial is en
titled to substantial deference on
factual findings. In light of the
strength of Judge Jackson's factual
findings, that fact alone should jolt
the company's resistance to dis
cussing the sort of accommodations
that would end the case.
whose brutality led to demands for
hate-crime laws across the coun
try.
The other man arrested, Russell
Henderson, 22, pleaded guilty in
April to kidnapping and murder
and is serving two life sentences.
Flight recorders and humans
work hand in hand in crash probe
by Don Phillips
The Washington Post
NEWPORT, R.I. -- Most people call
them "black boxes, - but aircraft
flight data recorders and cockpit
voice recorders should he called
magic boxes
The two boxes from Egypt Air
Flight 990, pinpointed Friday on the
bottom of the Atlantic by the USS
Grapple, may allow investigators
from the National Transportation
Safety Board to quickly learn the
cause of a crash that so far remains
a mystery. And the faster they know
why 217 people died, the faster they
can prevent a similar crash.
If Flight 990's voice and data re
corders contain usable information,
investigators will know far more
than just what the pilots said and did.
They will know the pilots' emotional
state, whether the plane responded
as the pilots intended, and even
whether or not the plane was hit by
an explosion, and exactly what ex
plosive was involved.
Safety hoard investigators are of
ten called "tin kickers," and it is true
that an experienced investigator can
often walk through a field of shred
ded metal and broken bodies and
read it like a hook.
13ut as new-generation airliners
begin to dominate aviation, crash in
vestigation has gone digital, creat-
ing new opportunities to delve into
a plane's secrets. Many computer
chips in the cockpit and the engines
have "nonvolatile memory" that can
he deciphered alter a crash.
But the plane's cockpit voice re
corder and Bight data recorder are
the mother lode.
For most Of the history of corn-
mercial aviation, recorders were
relatively unsophisticated. Voice re
• corders were hardly more than tape
recorders, and data recorders ranged
from rolls of tinfoil to analog instru
ments capable of recording only a
small number of parameters such as
airspeed and altitude.
Following the crash of USAir
Flight 427 at Pittsburgh on Sept. 8,
1994, safety hoard Chairman Jim
Hall began a crusade to force airlines
-- as the Federal Aviation Adminis
tration has since ordered -- to up
grade flight data recorders because
the Boeing 737's recorder had only
11 parameters and was of limited
value.
The Egypt Air flight data re
corder, by contrast, contains 74 mea
surements of airplane movements,
control surface movements, control
positions, altitude, aircraft speed,
outside wind speed, engine operation
and warning system activation. 'The
cockpit voice recorder contains the
last 30 minutes of cockpit sounds.
They are the most protected
piece of any jetliner. Modern record
ers are no larger than a thick disk that
easily fits in the palm of the hand.
They are encased in plastic and sur
rounded by electronic equipment
that also serves as a buffer for the
internal disk and are packed into an
orange-colored container that can
withstand crash forces and fires. The
orange box "is basically a dust
cover,'' said one investigator.
Crash investigation is replete
with examples of crashes solved by
flight and voice recorders, some
times by only one sound, one phrase
or one electronic clue.
On May 26, 1991, a Lauda Air
Boeing 767 suddenly dived into the
jungles of Thailand, crashing with
such force that even the well-pro
tected flight data recorder was de
stroyed. But the cockpit voice re
corder survived.
On the voice recorder, just at the
end, one pilot of the Austrian airliner
said "thrust reverser" in German.
That gave the tin kickers the clue
about where to concentrate their at
tention in the shredded wreckage of
the first Boeing 767 to crash. The
thrust reverser, a form of engine
brake, had deployed in flight, setting
up air currents that destroyed the lift
on one wing and sent the plane flip-
ping into a dive.
On Feb. 6, 1996, a Birgen Air
Boeing 757, carrying German tour
ists, took off from the Dominican Re
public. Within minutes, the pilots
seemed to lose touch with reality and,
in confusion, dived into 7,600 feet of
ea water.
Recovery of the plane and bod
ies was not possible at that depth, but
a remotely operated submarine re
trieved the recorders. The plane fell
for a simple reason: a blockage in the
plane's pitot tube, a small probe that
helps determine the plane's airspeed.
The plugged pitot tube fed con
fusing readings to the plane's instru
ments, leaving the crew disoriented
over the dark ocean.
The value of the information from
a flight data recorder is obvious. But
the value of the cockpit voice re
corder goes far beyond a mere record
ing of pilot voices.
A voice recorder gathers informa
tion from four microphones, one
next to each pilot, one in the instru
ment console and an "area mike" that
gathers sound overall.
The console mike is sensitive to
vibration in the plane's airframe, and
since vibration travels through the
airframe faster than sound will arrive
at the other mikes, it is possible to
pinpoint some loud sound -- such as
an explosion -- by measuring the mi
nuscule time difference between
sound and vibration.
Explosives leave distinctive
sound patterns, allowing the safety
board laboratory staff to determine
whether dynamite, plastic explosive
or something else was used.
The final sound on the cockpit
voice recorder of Trans World Air
lines Flight 800 in 1996 initially
stumped investigators because it fit
no known explosive. Further work
determined it was more eharadteris
tic of the explosion of a fuel-air mix
ture. The cause of the Boeing 747's
breakup was a fuel tank explosion.
Another mystery was the sound
of two "thumps" on the voice re
corder of USAir Flight 427 just as it
rolled and dived into a hillside near
Pittsburgh. Investigators knew that
the plane ran into turbulent air in the
wake of a plane flying four miles
ahead, but that didn't necessarily ex
plain two thumps.
But when the safety board's re
corder expert, James Cash, rode a test
flight to determine the effect of such
wakes on a Boeing 737, he heard the
distinctive two thumps as the plane
hit the wake at a certain angle.
Another field of cockpit voice re
corder research is to determine the
emotional state of the crew and its
performance. Pilots often speak in a
deliberate monotone, but they are still
subject to stress and fear.
In the USAir 427 crash, investi
gators used speech characteristics to
gauge the crew's stress level, a tech
nique pioneered by Russian aviation
authorities, to estimate the force be
ing applied by the crew to controls.
Sometimes voice and data re-
corders together can solve a mystery.
In the May 1996 Valujet onboard
fire and crash into the Everglades, a
loud bang from the cargo hold was
caught on the voice recorder but was
not readily identifiable.
At exactly the same moment on
the flight data recorder, the plane ap
peared to rapidly gain several dozen
feet in altitude and just as rapidly de
scend while sharply speeding up and
then sharply slowing down, some
thing physically impossible.
The answer? A tire in the cargo
hold had overheated in the fire and
exploded. It created a brief pressure
surge inside the airplane, affecting the
altimeter and airspeed indicators.
Voice and data recorders are only
one part of a crash investigation. The
safety board's laboratory also per
forms metallurgical and other tests,
and nothing has replaced the tin
kicker for interviewing witnesses,
collecting samples, studying damage
patterns, reviewing maintenance
records or making the final judgment
of why people died.
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