Businesses reopening at scene of on-air shootings; gunman remembered for bizarre outbursts
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Businesses are reopening in Virginia at the scene of this week's on-air shooting as more details surface of the gunman's long history of confronting and bullying co-workers at a succession of television and customer-service jobs.
Friday's reopening of Bridgewater Plaza comes two days after 41-year-old Vester Flanagan killed two journalists from a Roanoke TV station where he once worked, and wounded the Smith Mountain Lake Regional Chamber of Commerce official they were interviewing.
Flanagan's hair-trigger temper became evident at least 15 years ago at WTWC-TV in Tallahassee, Florida, said Don Shafer, who hired him there in 1999. Shafer recalled Flanagan as a good reporter and a "clever, funny guy" — but said he also had conflicts with co-workers "to the point where he was threatening people."