Philadelphian biscuit factory woman kills three colleagues after being suspended

A WOMAN who was suspended from her job at a Kraft Foods Inc. plant and escorted out, returned with a handgun and opened fire, killing two people and critically injuring a third before being taken into custody.

The shootings occurred in the early hours of yestrday morning, inside a northeast Philadelphia plant where workers for the largest food manufacturer in the United States make cookies and crackers.

About ten minutes after the woman was escorted from the plant, she returned in a car and drove through a security barrier before re-entering the building on foot, Lieutenant Frank Vanore said.

As she walked inside, she fired a wayward shot at an employee who had followed her in and shouted: "Hide, she's got a gun!" Lt Vanore said.

The woman then shot the three victims, said police, who did not release the victims' identities or say whether they had been targeted. Officers responded and isolated the gunwoman in a room. Lt Vanore said she fired a shot at them but missed.

Officers freed seven people who were "in a bad position" near the woman and were hiding, said Lt Vanore, who wouldn't refer to them as hostages. The woman was apprehended about an hour after the shootings started, he said.

Investigators, who refused to reveal why the woman had been suspended from her post, were working to piece together more about what led to the sequence of events. They did not identify her.

Dough mixer Andy Ryan, who has worked at the plant for nearly 30 years, said he was on the third floor when the sound of the shots echoed through the building.

"I heard the gunfire, and I ran," he said. "As I was running down the steps they were yelling, 'Oh, my God, there's three people shot!"'

It was reported that about 100 people were inside the plant but had been evacuated.

Kraft said in a statement that in addition to the three employees who were shot, a contract worker suffered a less serious injury. "This is a sad day for the Kraft Foods family," the statement said. "Our thoughts and prayers go out to their families.

Kraft said the plant would be closed until further notice and the company would provide employees with counselling.

Mass shootings are rarely carried out by women, said Dr Park Dietz, a forensic psychiatrist and president of Threat Assessment Group Inc., a violence prevention firm.

However, he added: "It was always a matter of time until we saw more incidents involving women."

Nevertheless, of the 10 to 20 multiple-victim workplace shootings in the U.S. each year, very few involve female shooters,Dr Dietz said.

Some notable exceptions include a 1985 rampage at a mall in Springfield, Pennsylvania, that left three people dead and seven wounded. Sylvia Seegrist was found guilty of murder but mentally ill in that case and was given three life sentences.

She said in 1991 she hoped she wouldn't have to spend the rest of her life in prison and "maybe 15 or 20 years would be fair."

Earlier this year, Amy Bishop, a former instructor and researcher at the University of Alabama-Huntsville, was charged with murder in a February campus shooting spree that left three biology professors dead and three other employees injured. She claimed the shootings "didn't happen."

The Kraft shootings came weeks after a driver who had been accused of stealing from a beer distributorship in Manchester, Connecticut, shot and killed eight people and then himself.

The driver, Omar Thornton, had calmly agreed to quit on 3 August after being confronted with surveillance video showing him stealing beer. But shortly afterward, he started shooting.

Thornton, who is black, told police dispatchers he had seethed with a sense of racial injustice in his job at Hartford Distributors.

But Hartford Distributors president Ross Hollander said there was no record to support claims of "racial insensitivity" made through the company's anti-harassment policy, the union grievance process or state and federal agencies. Relatives of the victims also rejected the claims.