Suspect of killing seven arrested after standoff
By Bruce Dunford
The Associated Press
HONOLULU—A Xerox copier
repairman suspected of killing
seven co-workers was arrested
Tuesday after a five-hour standoff
with police.
Byran Uesugi emerged from a
van he had parked near a nature
center, walked to the back of the
vehicle with his hands raised and
then fell down on the ground.
SWAT teams raced toward Ue
sugi with automatic weapons
drawn. No shots were heard and
no injuries were reported. •
Uesugi, 40, was believed to
have been armed during the
standoff.
Police believe Uesugi, a 15-year
Xerox employee, shot seven fel
low copier technicians at about 8
a.m. (1 p.m. EST) before fleeing in
a company van.
He eventually stopped several
miles away in a leafy, residential
neighborhood. Police cordoned
off the neighborhood and began
negotiating with him about two
hours later.
The gunfire erupted in an in
dustrial section of Honolulu, far
from the Waikiki tourist district.
Five victims were found dead in a
conference room and two other
bodies were found nearby. All
had been shot with a 9 mm hand
gun, authorities said.
“It appears as though it was a
disgruntled employee who
snapped,” Mayor Jeremy Harris
said. Police would not comment
on a motive though.
All seven victims were male
Xerox employees who were shot
on the second floor of the two-sto
ry building, authorities said. They
ranged in age from 33 to 58.
“It’s a shock for all of us. We
have such a safe community with
almost no violent crime,” Harris
said. “To have someone snap like
this and murder seven people is
just absolutely appalling.”
Uesugi was a member of his
high school rifle team and had up
to 17 weapons registered in his
name. “This could have been
much, much worse,” Harris said.
By late morning in Makiki
Heights, a residential neighbor
hood near the shooting scene, ne
gotiators were talking with the
suspect through a bullhorn. He
was seen pacing back and forth
outside the van.
Police cordoned off a half-mile
area around his van, which was
near the Hawaii Nature Center.
About 60 fourth-graders and 12
chaperones were on a nature hike
when police told them to get to
higher ground.
A school bus with two rifle-tot
ing police officers then took the
students to safety.
A separate group of first-graders
on a field trip also were evacuat
ed in the afternoon.
About 10 homes were also
evacuated. Neighborhood resi
dents set up lawn chairs in the
streets to watch the situation un
fold.
David Wallace was riding his
motorcycle through Makiki’s
winding roads when he spotted
the standoff.
“The cops were about a 9-iron
away from the van,” he said. “We
were definitely in the line of fire.”
Xerox employees were taken
across the street from the building
to be questioned by police and
helped by counselors. Another
Xerox building, in downtown
Honolulu, was evacuated in case
the gunman headed that way.
Xerox employs 92,700 people
worldwide and 148 people in
Honolulu.
Uesug joined Xerox Corp. in
1984. As a customer service engi
neer, he traveled to various sites
to service and repair printers and
copiers, Xerox said.
It was the latest of several work
place killings across the United
States this year.
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Investigators foresee difficult recovery
By David Tirrell-Wysocki
The Associated Press
NEWPORT, R.I. — Relatives
sobbed, screamed and fainted
Tuesday as crash investigators
warned them there was little hope
of finding intact bodies in the de
bris of EgyptAir Flight 990.
“Everybody was screaming and
crying, because they weren’t ex
pecting to hear something like
that,” said George Arian, of Jersey
City, N.J., who has been helping
victims’ families at a Newport ho
tel.
Arian said one relative was tak
en away in an ambulance after the
briefing, which was closed to re
porters.
All 217 people aboard the
Cairo-bound flight were killed
when the Boeing 767 plummeted
mysteriously into the sea a half
hour after leaving New York early
Sunday morning.
The Navy said its vessel Mo
hwak located what appeared to be
the pingers for both of the plane’s
“black boxes” on Tuesday after
noon.
The flight data and cockpit
voice recorders could provide key
clues for hundreds of investiga
tors who are trying to determine
why the plane fell from 33,000
feet without a distress call or any
other hint of trouble.
Coast Guard Capt. Russell Web
ster said worsening weather, with
seas of “8 to 10 feet and building,”
forced the Mohawk and compan
ion vessel Whiting to leave the de
bris field and head for shelter in
Newport. The bad weather was
expected to last two days.
Also reaching Newport was the
USS Grapple, a sonar-equipped
salvage ship carrying about 30
divers who will try to retrieve the
black boxes and other debris from
the 270-foot waters off Nantucket
Island, Mass.
Navy spokesman David
Sanders said the Grapple will
dock for at least 36 hours to load
additional supplies, then head to
a major debris field that has been
located by sonar.
By Tuesday afternoon, more
than 150 relatives had arrived in
Newport, where the search for
wreckage and human remains
was being coordinated. About 70
of the relatives flew in from Egypt,
accompanied by 39 Egyptian avi
ation and government officials.
“I wish it had been me who had
been sacrificed,” EgyptAir chair
man Mohammed Fahim Rayan
said before boarding the flight
from Cairo.
The investigation is looking
into all possibilities: human error,
mechanical failure and sabotage.
About 600 FBI agents have joined
in the investigation.
Egyptian officials confirmed
Tuesday that 33 Egyptian military
officers, including two brigadier
generals, were on the plane, re
turning home after undergoing
training in the United States. The
officers’ ranks had been kept off
the passenger list for security rea
sons. Egyptian military officials
have been key targets of attacks by
Islamic fundamentalists.
The victims also included 106
Americans, many of them retirees
embarking on tours to Egypt.
According to Arian, National
Transportation Safety Board offi
cials told relatives that identifying
victims could be extremely diffi
cult because of the small pieces
being retrieved. Only one body
has been recovered, and even that
one was not intact.
“Everybody here from the
Egyptian families expected to see
his loved one, his brother, his sis
ter, as a body that they could
identify easily,” Arian said. “The
news was a shock to all of them.”
This makes it impossible for
families to follow traditional Is
lamic rites, which call for a ritual
washing and shrouding of the
body and a quick burial, usually
within two days.
A morgue was set up in a gym
nasium, and a team including
forensic pathologists, dental ex
perts, X-ray technicians, forensic
anthropologists and the FBI disas
ter squad was assembled to iden
tify the remains. The investigators
may also have to use DNA.
Outside the Newport hotel
where the relatives are staying, a
tearful Sayed Gabr of Los Angeles
held a photo of his 54-year-old
sister, Fatima, as she turned to
wave before boarding the doomed
plane in Los Angeles. .
“I came here hoping I get my
sister out of the water. I’d like to
take her back home — I’d like to
bury her body back to Egypt,” he
said, sobbing.
Jury begins deliberating gay beating case
By Robert W. Black
The Associated Press
LARAMIE, Wyo. — The jury in
the beating death of gay college
student Matthew Shepard began
deliberating Tuesday after a de
fense attorney argued that the
man on trial flew into a rage when
a sexually aggressive Shepard
grabbed his crotch.
Shepard “was innocent, but he
was also forward, and people re
acted to that,” attorney Dion
Custis said. “We know you peo
ple may not like us trying to de
mean Matthew Shepard in any
way, but don’t hold that against
Aaron McKinney.”
Prosecutor Cal Rerucha coun
tered, “Matthew Shepard was not
an animal to be hung on a fence.”
Shepard, a 21-year-old fresh
man at the University of
Wyoming, was robbed of $20,
lashed to a fence on the freezing
prairie and pistol-whipped in the
head last year in a case that led to
calls for hate-crime laws that pro
tects gays.
Police said that robbery was the
main motive but that Shepard
may also have been singled out
because he was gay.
Russell Henderson, 22, pleaded
guilty to murder and kidnapping
and is serving two life sentences.
McKinney, 22, could get the
death penalty if convicted.
Defense attorneys have said
Shepard’s sexual advance trig
gered painful memories of homo
sexual encounters McKinney had*
as a boy.
Custis said the deadly assault
began because Shepard grabbed
McKinney’s genitals, and contin
ued because McKinney was un
der the influence of chronic
methamphetamine use.
“He’s not a calculating cold
blooded murder. His nickname is
Dopey. He’s a drug addict,” Custis
said.
Rerucha paused for 60 seconds
during his closing argument to let
jurors reflect in silence on the
one-minute beating inflicted on
Shepard before he was left to die.
“Think what 60 seconds was to
Matthew Shepard,” the prosecu
tor said. “It’s a short time if you’re
eating an ice cream cone. It’s a
long time if you’re descending
into hell.”
The jury of seven men and five
women could convict McKinney
of murder or a lesser charge, such
as second-degree murder or
manslaughter.
As deliberations began, about a
half-dozen death penalty support
ers gathered next to the court
house and staged a mock execu
tion by simulating the beating of
Shepard.
“We came here to request that
the murderer be handed over for
an execution,” said demonstrator
Doug McBumey.