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Twelve Dead in Atlanta Shootings
Nine Killed in Offices; Three Died in Suburban Home
By SHELLEY HILL
.c The Associated Press
ATLANTA (July 29) - A man in shorts, described as irate over stock trading losses, opened fire Thursday in two brokerage offices, killing nine people and wounding 12 before escaping. Three relatives of the suspect were found shot to death in their suburban home.
It was the latest in a grim wave of mass shootings at schools and workplaces and was among the worst office massacres ever.
Atlanta Mayor Bill Campbell said several witnesses recognized the gunman, identified as Mark Barton, 44. Roadblocks went up, and SWAT teams fanned through the complex of offices, but Campbell said police were not sure whether Barton was still in the area.
''It's a terrible tragedy for our city,'' Campbell said. ''Our prayers go out to the victims.''
Barton, a chemist, walked into a brokerage office at Securities Center in the upscale Buckhead section north of downtown Atlanta about 3 p.m., opened fire, then walked across the street and began shooting at another brokerage firm there, the mayor said.
Four of the victims were killed in one building and five in the other, shot with .9 mm and .45-caliber handguns, he said.
Seven of the injured were in critical condition at the trauma center of Grady Hospital.
A widespread search was launched for Barton, described as 6-foot-4, white, with a receding hairline.
A previous wife and mother-in-law of Barton were bludgeoned to death in 1993 in Cedar Bluff, Ala., said Scott Lloyd, a prosecutor there. The investigation is still open and there have been no arrests, he said, declining to comment on whether Barton was a suspect.
Campbell quoted witnesses as saying Barton was upset about recent stock losses, but said there were no accounts of any specific provocation on Thursday.
''Those who have identified Mr. Barton indicated he came in, had a normal conversation and then began shooting,'' Campbell said.
The Dow Jones industrial average closed down 180.78 for the day, a drop of 1.6 percent.
Some people were still hiding in offices nearly three hours after the shooting. Campbell said police SWAT units were going through every building in the area floor by floor, office by office, trying to find Barton.
Police also searched the trunks of cars leaving the area. Roadblocks went up throughout Buckhead, and motorists heading home during the evening rush hour were stopped and rerouted.
Barton was believed to be driving a dark Green 1992 Ford Aerostar van with Georgia license plate number 101CPD, police said.
Three relatives of Barton were found dead at an apartment in Stockbridge, the town 16 miles southeast of Atlanta where Barton lived, police said.
They would not identify them or give any other details, but Campbell said they may have been Barton's current wife and two children. Lt. Roger Stubbs of Henry County said the bodies had been there for a period of time.
Campbell said Vice President Al Gore had telephoned to offer condolences and federal assistance in coping with the shootings.
The shootings began at All-Tech Investment Group, a day-trading company on the third floor of one of the office buildings, company officials said.
Jai Ramoutar, director of All-Tech Trading Group, said Barton had not traded there in some time.
He came into the office, ''and after speaking with our branch manager suddenly stood up and for no reason opened fire on the manager and his secretary,'' Ramoutar said in a statement released from the company's headquarters in Montvale, N.J.
''This man then went into our main trading room and began indiscriminately shooting the customers,'' he said. ''The man then ran out of our office and continued shooting in another part of the office building....
''We don't know the reason, if any, for this horrible act of violence. All-Tech's customers trade their own accounts in our offices and this man was such a customer,'' he said.
Harvey Houtkin, 50-year-old president of All-Tech Investment Group, said from Montvale that his employees told him Barton hadn't traded since April.
''He (the gunman) was a former client.'' Houtkin said.
Just last month a psychiatrist in Michigan was killed by his former patient, who also gunned down a 45-year-old woman and injured four other people in the attack. He then fatally shot himself.
In April, a 71-year-old man raked the first floor of the Mormon Family History Library in Salt Lake City with .22-caliber handgun fire, killing two people and wounding four others before police shot him to death.
In January, a woman walked into a downtown Salt Lake office building with a grocery sack of bullets and opened fire. One person died and another suffered minor gunshot wounds in that shooting.
AP-NY-07-29-99 1919EDT
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