1:39
- ABC News
- June 1, 2019
11 of the 12 victims were city workers
The gunman was killed during a long-running gunfight.
1:39
The shooting erupted about 4 p.m. on Friday when Craddock allegedly gunned down one victim outside Building 2 of the Municipal Center as he entered the front door and continued the mass shooting.
\"Once he engaged in this activity it just continued throughout the building,\" Chief Cervera said.
Cervera said about 400 people work inside the four-story Building 2 of the Municipal Center on any given day and that the suspected gunman \"indiscriminately\" fired at and killed employees on every floor, except the basement.
![\"PHOTO:](\"http://a.abcnews.com/images/US/virginia-beach-001-gty-jpo-190601_hpMain_4x3t_384.jpg\")
Cervera said it remained unclear if there were victims Craddock was specifically set out to kill.
\"Whether it's an individual or not, we do have a large-scale number of victims that were killed by the suspect,\" Cervera said.
Ed Wheeden, a city employee, told ABC News that he was inside the building when he heard gunshots and a fire alarm sound.
He said he initially thought the shooter was a \"disgruntled citizen upset about his tax bill or water bill.\"
\"Never thought it would be an employee that you talk to daily,\" Wheeden said.
Another city employee, Megan Banton, said she and about 20 coworkers barricaded themselves in her boss' office. She said they pushed a desk in front of the door and hugged and held each other as the rampage was going on.
\"My boss basically was like, 'This is not a drill. Get down, call 911,' and that's when I called 911,\" Banton told ABC News. \"We all just ran in her office and closed the door. Basically, we just wanted to try and keep everyone safe as much as we could and staying on the phone with 911. We wanted to make sure they were coming. They couldn't come fast enough. It felt like hours.\"
Zand Bakhtiari, who also works in the building, said the carnage was evident immediately.
\"We knew there were casualties because we saw some people getting wheeled by,\" Bakhtiari told ABC News. \"Some of them weren't even in gurneys -- one dude was just lying on the back on the trunk of a cop car and they drove him to a secure area where the ambulance was.\"
Asked how well the building was secured, Cervera said, \"It's an open government building. Citizens have the right to access open government buildings. Employees have a right to access their work site.\"
Hansen said that while there are no metal detectors, desks are stationed nearby for administrative assistants to work with the public.
\"But all accesses to the inner offices and conference rooms are secured and require this [security] pass,\" he said, pointing to his own pass. \"And, as I've told you, he [the gunman] was in possession of a pass.\"
Cervera said officers responded to Building 2 within minutes of receiving the first 911 call.
He said two police officers, identified as detective supervisors, and two K-9 units rushed to shooting scene from the police station across the street, about 100 to 150 yards away and were met by people rushing out.
\"Officers had to make instantaneous decisions on how to engage the suspect,\" Cervera said. \"They did it miraculously because ... they did save other lives,\" he said.
Cervera said the officers quickly tracked down the suspect and engaged in a \"running gun battle with this individual\" that lasted less than 30 minutes before officers shot the gunman to death.
He said that while Virginia Beach police officers had trained for a large-scale active shooter incident on March 30, \"once you enter an environment such as this, things change in minutes.\"
\"You cannot replicate the intensity of an environment such as this,\" Cervera said.
He said there were no words exchanged between the gunman and police during the gunfight.
\"They didn't have any engagement with him verbally,\" Cervera said. \"Once they identified him and he identified them, he immediately opened fire. We immediately returned the fire and again, I want everyone to know, this was a long-term, for lack of any other term, long-running gun battle with this individual. This is not what is traditionally a police-involved shooting. This was a long-term, large gunfight.\"
As police investigated the shooting, members of the public joined outside the scene of the massacre Saturday and formed a prayer circle. Several vigils are being planned in churches throughout Virginia Beach.
ABC News' Whit Johnson, Halley Freger, Ahmad Hemingway and Sarah Shales contributed to this report.
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