A UPS employee who had recently filed a grievance opened fire Wednesday inside one of the company’s San Francisco packing facilities, killing three co-workers before fatally shooting himself as employees fled frantically into the streets shouting “shooter!,” authorities and witnesses said.
The gunman, Jimmy Lam, filed the grievance in March complaining that he was working excessive overtime, Joseph Cilia, an official with a Teamsters Union local that represents UPS workers in San Francisco, told The Associated Press. Still, Cilia said Lam wasn’t angry, and he could not understand why he would open fire on fellow drivers at a morning meeting. Lam appeared to target the three drivers who died, chasing at least one of them out of the building, Cilia said. Cilia said he spoke to witnesses who had been in the meeting of UPS drivers.
“I never knew Jimmy to not get along with people,” Cilia said. “Jimmy wasn’t a big complainer.”
Two other UPS employees were wounded, but Cilia said both were released from the hospital. The shooting that prompted a massive police response in one of the city’s industrial neighborhoods, about two miles from downtown San Francisco, Assistant Police Chief Toney Chaplin told reporters.