San Bruno: A shooting at YouTube’s California headquarters left at least three people wounded and a female suspect dead of an apparent suicide on Tuesday.
A suspected female shooter is dead and three others are injured after a mass shooting at YouTube’s headquarters in San Bruno, Calif., Tuesday afternoon, according to San Bruno police.
San Bruno police officials identified the shooter as 39-year-old Nasim Aghdam of San Diego, California, according to the Associated Press, but little is known about her motive. San Bruno police said there is no evidence that the shooter was previously acquainted with any of the victims. Two unnamed law enforcement officials previously said that the shooting was being investigated as a domestic dispute.
The shooter, who was found dead by law enforcement Tuesday, wore glasses and a scarf and carried a “big huge pistol,” according to a YouTube employee who witnessed the incident from a second-floor window.
YouTube employees said they heard shots and saw people running on social media Tuesday afternoon. San Bruno police said they saw employees fleeing the headquarters upon arriving to the area and found one gunshot victim toward the front of the building. Two other shooting victims were found in adjacent businesses. Four victims were transported to local hospitals, police said, including a 36-year-old man who was in critical condition. One of those people, who did not suffer a gunshot wound, was treated for an ankle injury.
San Bruno police said they found Aghdam, who died of what appeared to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound, at 12:53 p.m. in a courtyard area inside the YouTube complex.
Aghdam was an animal rights activist, according to AP, who participated in a 2009 protest with the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) in Oceanside, California. She was also a prolific YouTube user, posting videos on a range of topics from multiple accounts, according to a report by NBC’s Bay Area Investigative Unit. In a video posted in January, Aghdam alleged that the company “discriminated and filtered” her videos to reduce their number of views; she also published rants attacking the company on her personal website.
