Sitting-duck zones. Killing fields.
The Virginia Pilot has just revealed that one of DeWayne Craddock’s colleagues had considered bringing a gun to work on the day he opened fire at the Virginia Beach Municipal Center, killing 12 people, including Kate Nixon.
According to her attorney, Nixon decided not to bring a gun to work because of the building’s “gun free zone” policy.
The Pilot reports:
The public utilities engineer was concerned about DeWayne Craddock “as well as one other person,” said Kevin Martingayle, an attorney working with Nixon’s family. So on the night of May 30, Nixon had discussed with her husband, Jason, “whether or not she should take a pistol and hide it in her handbag,” Martingayle said. She decided against it because of a city policy that prevents employees from bringing weapons to work.
The next day, Craddock, who had worked as a city public utilities engineer for nine years, used a .45-caliber handgun with a legally purchased silencer to fire at colleagues in Building 2 of the city’s Municipal Center in Princess Anne.
“The night before it happened they had that discussion,” [Martingayle] said on [on WHRV’s “HearSay with Cathy Lewis” radio show]. “There was obviously something big going on.”
The Nixon family is pushing for an external investigation into the shooting, Matingayle said.
by Teresa Mull
