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Friday's Final Word
A gunman opened fire at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta late Friday afternoon, killing a local police officer but striking no other people.
The shooter, whose identity has not been released, was found dead in the 2nd floor of a building that houses a CVS drugstore at Emory Point, across the street from the CDC, Atlanta Police Chief Darin Schierbaum said at a news conference.
“He had been struck by gunfire, but we don’t know where that gunfire came from,” Schierbaum said.
DeKalb County CEO Lorraine Cochran-Johnson and Interim Police Chief Greg Padrick confirmed the death of the police officer, who was shot while responding to the initial calls about gunfire. Padrick declined to release his name for now but said that information will be provided later.
“Today is a very dark day in DeKalb County,” Cochran-Johnson said. “This evening there is a wife without a husband. There are three children, one unborn, without a fatter. There is a mother and a father as well as siblings who also share in this traumatic loss.”
Both officials asked for prayers for the officer’s family and for the DeKalb County family at large.
Initial 911 calls came in at about 4:50 p.m. and officers quickly found the DeKalb County police officer critically wounded on the scene, Schierbaum said. He was extracted and rushed to the hospital while the massive police response continued until the gunman was found dead.
Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens said that 92 children were trapped at a nearby daycare but that all those children were safe and were being reunited with family at a nearby school.
A law enforcement official told CNN that investigators learned from the gunman’s family that he was either sick or believed he was sick and blamed his illness on the COVID-19 vaccine. Officials did not confirm that information at a news conference, although Dickens said that the gunman “has a interest in certain things.”
Multiple bullet holes were seen in windows of CDC buildings.
Law enforcement also told CNN that the gunman’s father had informed police that he believed his son was suicidal, although it’s not clear when he made that call to law enforcement.
State and federal officials will be assisting the Atlanta Police Department in the investigation. Schierbaum said that further information would be released as the investigation continues.
