By Matthew Chayes and Andrew Strickler
Newsday
(MCT)
NEW YORK _ The gunman behind the deadliest shooting rampage in modern New York history was apparently disgruntled because he'd been recently fired and felt "looked down upon" because of his broken English, Binghamton, N.Y.'s city police chief said Saturday.
Wearing a bulletproof vest and armed with two handguns and a satchel of ammunition, Jiverly Wong, 41, stormed an upstate center for immigrants _ where he had himself been a student until last month _ fatally shot 13 people on Friday and wounded four others before turning a gun on himself, officials said.
Police said the body armor and the extra ammunition suggested the attack was well-planned and that Wong anticipated a firefight with police, although he killed himself just before police arrived.
"He was upset about losing his job and felt disrespected and looked down upon because of his not being able to speak English," Joseph Zikuski of the Binghamton Police Bureau said Saturday.
Zikuski said people close to Wong, who had changed his last name to Voong and lived with his mother, father and sister in nearby Johnson City, told police that Wong's violent spree was "no surprise" to them.
But, Zikuski said, "We may never know the true motive."
The chief said the shooter had been laid off from his job as a per diem employee at Shop-Vac.
The bloodbath began Friday when the shooter arrived at the American Civic Association, which helps immigrants settle in the United States, in Binghamton shortly before 10:30 a.m. He blocked a rear exit with a Toyota Camry borrowed from his father, police said, before entering the front door.
"He never spoke a word," Zikuski said Saturday at a news conference.
He quickly shot two receptionists before turning to an adjacent classroom and firing repeatedly at people there. One wounded receptionist, who police said pretended to be dead, called 911 and hid under a desk.
The suspected gunman's body was found in the classroom where the shooting happened. Two handguns, for which Wong had permits, were recovered.
A total of 37 people _ including more than two dozen people who heard the initial shots and barricaded themselves in a boiler room _ escaped unhurt.
Most of those killed did not speak English and were at the center for language and citizenship classes. Andrew Block, a Binghamton city spokesman, said officials have begun to reach out to friends and relatives of victims. Zikuski said authorities would try to begin releasing names of victims late Saturday.
The two handguns were registered to Jiverly Wong, he said; fingerprints on the gun permit matched fingerprints taken from the shooter's body.
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Among the wounded was a visiting chemistry scholar from Binghamton University, according to school spokesman Ryan Yarosh. The position is supported by the Chinese government, although he could not confirm the scholar's nationality.
As SWAT teams spent hours securing the building, relatives of many still inside waited for word at a nearby relief center.
Among them was Omri Yigal, 53, whose wife, Dolores, was at the center Friday morning. A recent immigrant from the Philippines, she takes English classes in the hope of attaining American citizenship, Yigal said.
"I need to know where she is, how she's doing and if she's OK," Omri said as he stood in a drizzle.
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New York Gov. David A. Paterson expressed his "profound outrage at a senseless act of violence in which innocent people were killed, injured and probably traumatized."
The shooting follows several other bloody incidents in recent months and years. In March alone, gunmen in North Carolina, California and Alabama shot and killed a total of 23 people in separate incidents. Last year, a man opened fire in an Illinois university lecture hall, fatally shooting five students before committing suicide. In April 2007, Seung-Hui Cho fatally shot 32 people at Virginia Tech University in Blacksburg.
Vice President Joe Biden, who was in Manhattan to deliver a speech Friday, asked for prayers for the Binghamton community. "We got to figure out a way to deal with this senseless, senseless violence," he said.
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Among the community and government organizations offering assistance is the American Red Cross Southern Tier Chapter, whose executive director said victims and their families might continue to reach out for help well after the shooting.
"They may not need us today, they may need us next week," she said. "It's like when there's a death in the family, and you spend the first few days planning the funeral, it's very busy. You don't really process. The processing comes after all that initial activity and you realize what's happened," executive director Cynthia Gordineer said.
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(Evan Drellich in Binghamton, N.Y., contributed to this report.)
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© 2009, Newsday.
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Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
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GRAPHIC (from MCT Graphics, 202-383-6064): NY SHOOTINGS
