Ohio State Shooting Leaves 1 Dead, 2 Wounded

(March 9) -- A custodial worker at Ohio State University who was about to lose his job opened fire in a maintenance building early this morning, killing a supervisor and wounding another before fatally shooting himself, university police said.

The gunman, Nathaniel Brown, had worked at the university since October, police said. He was notified on March 2 that Saturday would be his last day because of an unsatisfactory performance review. The university released documents saying he was tardy, slept on the job and failed to follow through on simple tasks.

"This incident appears to be work-related," said the university's police chief, Paul Denton, at a news conference. "Nathaniel Brown had a poor performance evaluation and came back then to initiate this incident."

Courtesy of Ohio State University

Nathaniel Brown began working at Ohio State University in October. Police said he had received a poor performance review before Tuesday's deadly on-campus shooting.

Brown served about five years in prison for receiving stolen property and was released in 1984, but lied about his record on his job application, The Associated Press said.

Brown went to work this morning and entered an office suite and began shooting while more than six employees were at work, police said.

"He came to work earlier this morning, dressed in dark clothing, a hoodie, carrying some type of backpack," said Denton, adding that two handguns were involved. "He simply entered the work area where he normally would come to work, and the shooting began in an office area."

After authorities received a 911 call at about 3:30 a.m., police found Larry Wallington, 48, a building services manager, dead. The other person shot, 60-year-old operations shift leader Henry Butler, was wounded and in stable condition at the Ohio State University Medical Center, police said. Both had worked at the university for 10 years.

Brown shot himself at the maintenance building and was taken to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead, police said.

"This is a tragic event, and our hearts go out to all of the families," Vernon Baisden, the university's director of public safety, said at a news conference.

After the shooting, heavily armed campus officers searched buildings across campus, according to reports, and police said earlier that the person responsible was arrested.

None of the 55,000 students at the Columbus, Ohio, campus was injured.

Classes were resuming this morning. "We're back to normal," said Jim Lynch, the university's director of media relations.

Lynch said he believed today was the first time the university issued a Buckeye Alert, which notified the campus of the shooting via text messages, e-mails and phone messages. Such campus alert systems became more common after a student gunman killed 32 people and himself at Virginia Tech in April 2007.