RiskAlert INCIDENT REPORT 552 – HOSPITAL SHOOTER
Terminated Employee Shoots Staff Member during Card Game
at Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Dayton, Ohio
Allowing terminated employees to have access to a hospital or facility where they
worked before is a questionable decision, because not only anger at the organization,
but also anger at individuals and former co-workers may turn into an incident as this report
explains.
In early May, a terminated housekeeper at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Dayton, Ohio came back to the hospital to play cards in a hospital break room with a group of current VA staff. The perpetrator, Neil Moore, had also brought a handgun to the hospital. Neil was upset because he thought another VA staff member was having a relationship with his wife, so he pulled out the gun, and as a result, one person was shot in the ankle.
It was not a typical active shooter scenario, but it does point out
the access control problem in hospitals, and also questions the
ability for anyone to walk into a hospital with a loaded gun.
LESSONS LEARNED:
1. Access to former employees should be prohibited or at
least limited on a case by case basis.
2. Visitors should not be allowed to bring guns into a hospital.
Metal detectors should be used to screen for weapons.
Moore, a former employee at the Veterans Affairs hospital, told police that he was going to a regular card game with
his former co-workers. He said he went to the hospital Monday intending to brandish the handgun to intimidate two former co-workers he believed were involved in relationships with his wife and daughter, both of whom reportedly work at the hospital. Moore planned to “hold the ex-co-workers at gunpoint while he punched them with his right hand,” according to court documents.
The hospital complex has beds for about 450 people and provides veterans with medical, mental health and nursing home care. It doesn’t have metal detectors at its entrances, but it does have its own security force.
VA spokesman Ted Froats said the force conducts active shooter training four times a year and showed outstanding response Monday. He said in a statement Tuesday that the hospital will consider additional steps to ensure safety, while making sure that any new measures won’t impede the hospital from providing care to veterans as quickly as possible.
RISKAlert® is a publication of Risk & Security LLC at www.riskandsecurity.com