WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — A gunman in a jacket and tie wordlessly opened fire inside a Wendy’s during the lunchtime rush Monday, wounding five and killing a paramedic who had gone back to fetch the right toy to go with his child’s meal. The shooter then committed suicide.
A sheriff’s spokesman said the shooting by Alburn Edward Blake, 60, appeared to be random.
The 42-year-old victim, Palm Beach County Fire-Rescue Lt. Rafael Vazquez, who was not in uniform, had met his wife and child at the restaurant during a break in training down the street, Deputy Fire-Rescue Chief Steve Delai said. The family had gotten their food and walked out, but Vazquez returned because the wrong free toy had been included in the kids’ meal, detectives said.
Vazquez’s wife, a law enforcement officer in nearby Palm Springs, and child were in the parking lot when he was shot in the back at the counter.
Three of the survivors were critically wounded, but all had improved and were hospitalized and stable Monday evening, the sheriff’s spokesman said. They included a 43-year-old man, a 16-year-old girl, and a 65-year-old man and his 62-year-old wife. Two others had minor injuries.
Arizona: Grand Canyon’s big bath
The Grand Canyon is taking a bath today and Wednesday, and National Park Service officials who oversee the iconic monument are worried. Federal flood control managers plan to unleash millions of cubic feet of water from behind the Glen Canyon Dam to do a “flush” of the huge canyon bottom meant to simulate a springtime flood. National park officials said that 10 years of research at a cost of $80 million had shown the flooding as planned could wreak irreparable harm to the national park’s ecology and other resources.
Connecticut: Jury gets sailor’s case
Federal prosecutors in New Haven urged a jury Monday to convict a former Navy sailor of leaking ship movements to suspected terrorists, saying he sympathized with the enemy and admitted disclosing military intelligence. But an attorney for Hassan Abu-Jihaad said an investigation failed to turn up proof that he leaked details of ship movements and their vulnerability to attack. A jury will begin deliberating Abu-Jihaad’s fate today.
Texas: Motive in family slaying
A high school couple in Alba forced to break up spent about a month plotting to kill the girl’s parents before her mother and two younger brothers were fatally shot and stabbed in a Saturday ambush, according to records released Monday. Charlie James Wilkinson, who had been dating Penny and Terry Caffey’s 16-year-old daughter, told police his girlfriend wanted her parents dead because they forbade their relationship, according to investigators. The daughter; Wilkinson, 19; Charles Allen Waid, 20; and Bobbi Gale Johnson, 18, are each charged with three counts of capital murder. The girl has not been identified because of her age. All four were being held Monday on $1.5 million bond.
Somalia: U.S. airstrike hits town
The U.S. Navy fired at least one missile into a southern Somali town before dawn Monday, targeting a terrorism suspect. Residents and police in Dobley said at least eight people, including four children, were seriously injured when a home was destroyed. The Tomahawk cruise missile was launched from a U.S. submarine off the coast of the African nation, U.S. officials said, but they declined to identify the target or provide other details.
Israel: Peace possible, Rice says
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice urged Palestinians on Monday to quickly resume peace talks with Israel, suspended in protest over an Israeli military offensive that killed more than 100 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Despite the violence, she said a deal to end the six-decade conflict is still possible before President Bush leaves office. Israeli troops withdrew from northern Gaza on Monday, but Israel’s leaders warned that a broad offensive against Islamic militants would continue. Israeli airstrikes and Palestinian rocket attacks persisted into the night.
Russia: Transfer of power
President Vladimir Putin fast-tracked the transfer of power to President-elect Dmitry Medvedev on Monday and signaled the Kremlin won’t back down from its pull-no-punches anti-U.S. foreign policy or ease up on its critics at home. Medvedev has stressed he will pursue Putin’s foreign and domestic agenda, and in a sign that little would change, Russia reduced natural gas supplies to Western-leaning Ukraine, and more than 100 protesters who took to the streets of Moscow on Monday to demonstrate against the election were roughed up and carted off in buses by throngs of riot police, opposition leaders said.
Nepal: U.N. chopper crash kills 10
A United Nations helicopter crashed Monday while flying in bad weather in Nepal’s mountainous east, killing seven U.N. staff and three crew, U.N. officials said. The helicopter went down about 125 miles east of Kathmandu as it was returning to the capital from a Maoist cantonment site in eastern Nepal’s mountainous region, U.N. officials said. Nepalese authorities said the helicopter was flying in bad weather.
From Herald news services
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