Indianapolis shooting: 8 killed at FedEx facility, police say

Police scoured a FedEx facility in Indianapolis and searched the suspected gunman’s home Friday looking for a motive for the latest mass shooting to rock the U.S. as victims’ family members spent agonizing hours awaiting word on their loved ones.

The shooter was identified as 19-year-old Brandon Scott Hole of Indiana, two law enforcement officials briefed on the matter told the Associated Press. He allegedly opened fire with a rifle at the facility, killing eight people and wounding several others, before killing himself.

FedEx spokesperson Bonny Harrison said he was a former employee. Harrison said company officials couldn’t speculate on a motive but were working closely with investigators.

Investigators searched a home in Indianapolis associated with Hole and seized evidence, including desktop computers and other electronic media, according to the law enforcement officials, who were not permitted to discuss the matter publicly and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.

Deputy Police Chief Craig McCartt said the gunman started randomly shooting at people in the parking lot, then went into the building and continued firing. He said the gunman apparently died by suicide shortly before police entered the building.

“There was no confrontation with anyone that was there,” he said. “There was no disturbance, there was no argument. He just appeared to randomly start shooting.”

McCartt said four people were killed outside the building and another four inside. Several people were also wounded, including five who were taken to the hospital.

The carnage took just a couple of minutes. “It did not last very long,” McCartt said.

Officials with the coroner’s office began the process of identifying victims Friday afternoon, a process they said would take several hours.

Police Chief Randal Taylor noted that a “significant” number of employees at the facility are members of the Sikh community, and the Sikh Coalition later confirmed that members of the community were among the wounded and killed.

The coalition, which identifies itself as the largest Sikh civil rights organization in the U.S., said in a statement that it expected authorities to “conduct a full investigation — including the possibility of bias as a factor.” The coalition’s executive director, Satjeet Kaur, noted in the statement that more than 8,000 Sikh Americans live in Indiana.

The families’ agonizing wait was exacerbated by the fact that most employees aren’t allowed to carry cellphones inside the FedEx building, making contact with them difficult.

“When you see notifications on your phone, but you’re not getting a text back from your kid and you’re not getting information and you still don’t know where they are … what are you supposed to do?” Mindy Carson, whose daughter Jessica works at the facility, said early Friday, fighting back tears.

Later Friday morning, Carson said she had heard from her daughter and that she was OK.

FedEx said in a statement that cellphone access is limited to a small number of workers in the dock and package sorting areas of the building to “support safety protocols and minimize potential distractions.”

FedEx Chairman and Chief Executive Frederick Smith called the shooting a “senseless act of violence.”

“This is a devastating day, and words are hard to describe the emotions we all feel,” he wrote in an email to employees.

This was at least the third mass shooting this year in Indianapolis. Five people, including a pregnant woman, were shot and killed in January, and a man was accused of killing three adults and a child before abducting his daughter during an argument at a home in March.

Elsewhere recently, eight people were fatally shot at massage businesses in the Atlanta area, and 10 died in gunfire at a supermarket in Boulder, Colo.

Indianapolis Mayor Joe Hogsett said the community must guard against resignation and “the assumption that this is simply how it must be and we might as well get used to it.”

President Biden said he had been briefed on the shooting and called gun violence “an epidemic” in the U.S.

“Too many Americans are dying every single day from gun violence. It stains our character and pierces the very soul of our nation,” he said in a statement.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she was “horrified and heartbroken” by the shooting and called for congressional action on gun control.

Family and friends wait for word on people who were at the FedEx facility during Thursday night’s shooting.

(Mykal McEldowney / Indianapolis Star)

“As we pray for the families of all affected, we must work urgently to enact commonsense gun violence prevention laws to save lives & prevent this suffering,” the Democratic leader said in a tweet.

A witness said that he was working inside the FedEx building when he heard several gunshots in rapid succession.

“I see a man come out with a rifle in his hand, and he starts firing…