6 Shot, 1 Fatally, at Wash. Jewish Center
By TIM BOOTH
Associated Press Writer
AP Photo/ELAINE THOMPSON
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SEATTLE (AP) -- Patti Simon was working in the Jewish Federation's office when she heard screaming, gunshots and what sounded like furniture crashing on the floor above her.
She tried calling her co-workers upstairs, but no one answered, so she called police and fled. "People got shot, some of our co-workers," she said, her voice shaking.
Authorities said a man walked into the Jewish agency on Friday and opened fire, killing one woman and injuring at least five others in what they call a hate crime. Naveed Afzal Haq, 30, was booked into the King County Jail for investigation of homicide and attempted homicide, police said.
The gunman, who employees said claimed to be a Muslim angry at Israel, forced his way through the center's security door after an employee had punched in her security code, said Marla Meislin-Dietrich, a co-worker who was not at the building at the time.
Staff members said they overheard him saying "'I am a Muslim American, angry at Israel,' before opening fire on everyone," Meislin-Dietrich said. "He was randomly shooting at everyone."
Police would not confirm the account. When asked if the suspect was Muslim, Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske said at a news conference, "you could infer that that was his background."
As employees fled the center, a SWAT team raced to the scene and blocked off several downtown blocks. The gunman surrendered moments later after speaking with a 911 dispatcher. That conversation led police to believe the shooting was a hate crime, authorities said.
"This was a purposeful, hateful act, as far as we know by an individual acting on his own," Mayor Greg Nickels said at the news conference.
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Authorities said officers were moving to protect both synagogues and mosques around the city but there was no evidence of a broad threat. Police were protecting mosques "because there's always the concern of retaliatory crime," Kerlikowske said.
Authorities have been advising synagogues and Jewish groups to be watchful in the weeks since hostilities erupted between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon. They said the warning was not in response to any specific threats.
The federation's Web site describes its mission as "to ensure Jewish survival and enhance the quality of Jewish life by meeting needs locally, in Israel and worldwide." It was among sponsors of a Solidarity With Israel rally last weekend.
One of the victims died at the scene and five others were hospitalized at Harborview Medical Center, Kerlikowske said. The names of the victims were not immediately released.
Three of the injured women, who had been shot in the abdomen, were upgraded from critical to serious condition Saturday morning, hospital spokeswoman Susan Gregg-Hanson said. Two others were in satisfactory condition: a 37-year-old woman, five months pregnant, who had been shot in the forearm; and another woman who was shot in the knee.
Haq previously lived in Pasco in southeast Washington, police said in a statement late Friday. The Seattle Times reported that Haq had lived most recently in Everett, north of Seattle, but police would not confirm that. The FBI's Seattle office said Haq was a U.S. citizen.
Haq's lawyer, Larry Stephenson, told The Times that he thought Haq was single and unemployed. Stephenson said Haq had a misdemeanor lewd conduct charge pending in Benton County, near Pasco. He had been accused of exposing himself in a public place, he told The Times.
Haq's parents were shaken by his arrest in the shootings, the lawyer said.
"I talked to his father, and his mother is crying, and they don't know what is going on," Stephenson said. "They are very, very shook up.
