5 Dead In Oklahoma Hospital Shooting, Tulsa Police Say

Topline

Five people were killed in a shooting at a hospital in Tulsa on Wednesday, including the shooter, police announced, marking Oklahoma’s second mass shooting in a public space in three days.

Key Facts

Police received a call about an active shooter on Tulsa’s St. Francis Hospital campus slightly before 5 p.m. local time, Tulsa Police Department Deputy Chief Eric Dalgleish said in a press conference.

Police say the gunman opened fire on the second floor of a medical building, fatally shooting four people.

The shooter—a man between the ages of 35 and 40 who was purportedly armed with a rifle and a handgun—died from what appeared to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to Dalgleish.

What We Don’t Know

Police have not released the alleged gunman’s name or given details on his motive, but Tulsa Police Capt. Richard Meulenberg told CNN “this was not a random event” and he “very purposefully went to this location.”

Tangent

In recent weeks, several deadly shootings across the U.S. have drawn national attention. The incident at St. Francis Hospital came just days after one person was killed and seven were injured in a shooting at a Memorial Day event in Taft, Oklahoma—about 45 miles from Tulsa. Plus, a gunman at a Texas elementary school killed 19 children and two adults last week, and 10 people were killed by a shooter at a Buffalo supermarket last month. Some 233 mass shootings have been reported nationwide this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which defines a mass shooting as an incident in which four people aside from the perpetrator were killed or wounded.

Further Reading

“Mass Shooting In Texas Followed 2 Years Of Surging U.S. Gun Sales” (Forbes)