Suspect in Fla. office shooting denied bond
ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) - A man charged with killing a worker and
wounding five others in the Orlando engineering firm where he once
worked has been denied bond.
A judge Saturday ordered 40-year-old Jason Rodriguez held
without bail at the Orange County Jail in Orlando.
His defense attorney, Bob Wesley, asked the judge that police
and prosecutors have no contact with Rodriguez without his
permission.
Police said Rodriguez told detectives he blamed the firm for
recent trouble he had receiving unemployment benefits.
The man killed in the Friday shooting was identified by police
as 26-year-old Otis Beckford. The five wounded people were in
stable condition at Orlando hospitals and police say all are
expected to survive.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further
information. AP's earlier story is below.
ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) - Employees at an engineering firm recognized
their former co-worker when he drew a handgun from under his shirt,
police said, and shot his first victim dead in the reception area.
He then walked into the office and unloaded several more rounds,
wounding five other employees at the company that fired him two
years ago.
Jason Rodriguez was taken into custody several hours after the
shooting Friday at a downtown Orlando office tower, and police say
he will be charged with first-degree murder and other crimes.
Police said Rodriguez told detectives he blamed the firm for
recent trouble he had receiving unemployment benefits. As officers
led him handcuffed into a police station, a reporter asked the
divorced 40-year-old why he had attacked his former colleagues.
``Because they left me to rot,'' said Rodriguez, who recently
told a bankruptcy judge he was making less than $30,000 a year at a
Subway sandwich shop and had debts of nearly $90,000.
All the victims worked at the firm of Reynolds, Smith and Hills,
where Rodriguez was an entry-level engineer for 11 months before he
was fired in June 2007, the company said.
Witnesses told police Rodriguez entered the company's
eighth-floor lobby, pulled a handgun from a holster and fatally
shot an employee standing next to the receptionist's desk. The
slain victim, identified by police as 26-year-old Otis Beckford,
was hit by at least two bullets. The gunman then went into the
common work area and opened fire on his other victims.
The five wounded people were in stable condition at Orlando
hospitals and police say all are expected to survive. Four of the
victims, three men and a woman ranging in age from 23 to 49, were
recovering Saturday at Orlando Regional Medical Center, said
hospital spokeswoman Katie Dagenais.
Hours after the shootings that paralyzed downtown Orlando,
police tracked Rodriguez to his mother's home and ordered him to
come out. He surrendered peacefully, apologizing as officers
handcuffed him, police said.
``I'm just going through a tough time right now. I'm sorry,''
officers quoted him as saying.
Rodriguez worked on drawings in the firm's transportation group,
but his supervisors said his performance was not up to their
standards, and when he did not improve, he was fired. The company
did not hear from him again.
``This is really a mystery to us,'' said Ken Jacobson, the
firm's general legal counsel and chief financial officer. ``There
was nothing to indicate any hard feelings.''
Rodriguez told detectives that the company had fired him without
cause and had made him look incompetent. He told them he was
unemployed for a year and a half before getting a job at a Subway,
where worked until recently.
He told them the shop couldn't give him enough hours, and he
later filed for unemployment. He expected to get a check recently
but when it didn't arrive he blamed Reynolds, Smith and Hills,
thinking it was harming his efforts to qualify, police said. He
told police he could no longer support his family.
Rodriguez' bankruptcy filing and his former mother-in-law
suggested he was plagued by money woes.
Les Winograd, a spokesman for Milford, Conn.-based Subway
Restaurants, said Rodriguez had worked for one of the sandwich
shops in the Orlando area until six weeks ago. He would not say
whether Rodriguez was fired.
His ex-wife's mother, America Holloway, told The Associated
Press that Rodriguez and her daughter, Neshby, were married for
about 6 1/2 years before divorcing several years ago. They have an
8-year-old son who lives with Neshby in Kissimmee, about a
half-hour away.
Holloway said the couple lived with her in Orlando for several
years and that Rodriguez abused her daughter and once threw all her
clothes into the street.
``I used to tell my daughter he was crazy,'' Holloway said. ``He
was always fighting, always yelling. There was always problems.''
After the divorce, Rodriguez seldom saw his son, but he called
last week while the child was at Holloway's house and the boy asked
his father why he did not come over, too.
``He said, 'Because I don't have any money. I don't have a job.
I don't have anything to eat. When things get better, I'll come see
you,''' Holloway said Rodriguez told his son.
Charles Price, an attorney who represented Rodriguez in his
bankruptcy case, said he could not comment on specifics of the
matter. He had not seen Rodriguez since the summer.
The Orlando Sentinel reported on its Web site that Rodriguez was
detained by the Orange County Sheriff's Office in June 2007 after
it received a report that he was a ``danger to self and others.''
Nursing aide Denise Exume, 39, told The Associated Press on
Friday that during the 2007 incident she was asked to watch him
after he was taken to Florida Hospital-East in Orlando for a mental
health exam. He wasn't allowed to leave the room, but he stood up
and said he wanted to use the bathroom. Exume tried to block him.
``He just pushed me,'' she said. He left, and she was evaluated
in the emergency room and didn't press charges. The hospital
declined comment, citing privacy laws.
Associated Press writers Travis Reed, Kelli Kennedy, Jennifer
Kay, Laura Wides-Munoz, David Fischer and Damian Grass in Miami;
Mitch Stacy and Tamara Lush in Orlando; and Christine Armario in
Tampa contributed to this report.
11/07/09 10:18
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