WASHINGTON (AP)- A gunman coolly drew a weapon from his pocket and opened fire at a security checkpoint into the Pentagon on Thursday in a point-blank attack that wounded two police officers before the suspect was fatally shot.
The two officers suffered grazing wounds and were being treated in a hospital, said Richard Keevill, chief of Pentagon police. The shooter, identified as John Patrick Bedell, 36, of California, died hours after being admitted to a hospital in critical condition, authorities said. They had no motive for the shooting.
The shooter walked up to the checkpoint at the Pentagon's subway entrance in an apparent attempt to get inside the massively fortified Defense Department headquarters. "He just reached in his pocket, pulled out a gun and started shooting" no more than five feet away, Keevill said. "He walked up very cool. He had no real emotion on his face." The Pentagon officers returned fire with semiautomatic weapons.
Bedell's death was confirmed early Friday by Beverly Fields, chief of staff of the D.C. medical examiner's office; and Leigh Fields, medical legal investigator for the office. Both said Bedell's body had arrived at the medical examiner's office.
The assault at the very threshold of the Pentagon -- the U.S. capital's ground zero on Sept. 11, 2001 -- came four months after a deadly attack on the Army's Fort Hood, Texas, post allegedly by a U.S. Army psychiatrist with radical Islamic leanings. In the immediate aftermath Thursday, investigators did not think terrorism was involved but were not ruling that out and did not discuss possible motives.
President Barack Obama was closely following the case with updates from the FBI through his homeland security and counterterrorism adviser, John Brennan," White House spokesman Nick Shapiro said.
