Ambush Set to Kill NY Firefighters

25 Dec, 2012

A gunman who shot dead two firefighters after luring them to a blaze has previously been in prison for killing his grandmother with a hammer. Crazed shooter William Spengler, 62, spent 17 years in jail after killing the 92-year-old in 1980 in a horrific attack.

He murdered his grandmother at the house next door to where he shot five firemen yesterday – killing two and seriously wounding two others. His sister Cheryl, 67, who lived with him in Webster, New York State, has not yet been accounted for, according to police.

One friend today claimed Spengler “hated” his sister and “could not stand her”. Investigators are still trying to work a motive for the killings. Spengler was paroled in 1998 for the hammer murder and had led an apparently quiet life since.

His victims were named as Police Lt. Michael Chiapperini, 43, the Webster Police Department’s public information officer, and 19-year-old Tomasz Kaczowka, also an emergency dispatcher.

Colleagues described Chiapperini as a “lifetime firefighter” with nearly 20 years with the department, and called Kaczowka a “tremendous young man”. Two other firefighters who were also shot and wounded – Joseph Hofstetter and Theodore Scardino – are thought to be stable in hospital.

Hofstetter was hit once in the pelvis, and the bullet lodged in his spine, authorities said, while Scardino was hit in the chest and knee. Spengler traded shots with police officers who arrived with an armored truck they used to remove the injured, as well as people living nearby.

He was chased on foot from his perch, then killed himself before he could be subdued, cops said. Spengler’s mother, Arline, died in October.

In her obituary, donations are understood to have been directed to the “West Webster Firemen’s Association (Ambulance Fund).’’ A police source said: “We are aware of it and are trying to figure out a connection.”

Roger Vercruysse, who lived next door to Spengler, said he doted on his mother and “hated” his sister. He said: “He loved his mama to death” adding he: “couldn’t stand his sister” and “stayed on one side of the house and she stayed on the other.”

The incident, which comes as debate rages in the United States about gun control following the Newtown school massacre earlier this month, happened shortly before 6:00 am in a small lakefront residential community.

Police chief Gerald Pickering said: “It does appear that it was a trap that was set for our first responders. “The neighbourhood is popular with recreational boaters but is normally quiet this time of year. “People who get up in the middle of the night to fight fires, they don’t expect to get shot and killed.

“We are a safe community, a tragedy like this is just horrendous.” The firefighters were shot as they approached the scene of the blaze – a car and a house engulfed in a fire that they now believe was set intentionally by Spengler.

Mr Pickering said: “Four of the firefighters were shot. Two are deceased, two were transported to area hospitals.” A fifth off-duty police officer who responded was also shot and wounded. One of the injured firefighters – all volunteers – was able to escape and call for help. The injured man was heard on a police scanner shouting: “We are being shot at. Multiple firemen down.

“Multiple firemen are shot. I am shot. I think he is using an assault rifle. We have multiple firemen down. Working fire.”

A security cordon was put up around the scene and residents were evacuated. Seven homes were destroyed in the blaze, as the shooting thwarted initial efforts to douse the flames. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said state police and the Office of Emergency Management were working with local law enforcement to respond to the scene.

He also offered his condolences to the families of the victims of the “horrific shooting” and “senseless act of violence.”

Mr Cuomo said: “New York’s first responders are true heroes as they time and again selflessly rush toward danger in order to keep our families and communities safe. “We as the community of New York mourn their loss as now two more families must spend the holidays without their loved ones.”

The incident in Webster came 10 days after a shooting rampage at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut that saw a disturbed young man gun down 20 children, aged six and seven, and six adults.

The shooter, Adam Lanza, had killed his mother at their home before heading to the school, where he eventually took his own life. The Newtown shooting has revived debate in the United States on the country’s gun laws, which are far more lax than in most other developed nations.

President Barack Obama said he would support a new bill to ban assault rifles, and has put Vice President Joe Biden in charge of a panel looking at a wide range of other measures, from school security to mental health.

Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein has pledged to introduce a bill in January that would ban at least 100 military-style semi-automatic assault weapons, and would curb the transfer, importation and possession of such arms.

But the nation’s most powerful gun lobby, the National Rifle Association, strongly opposes any new restraints in gun sales, with the group’s executive vice president Wayne LaPierre calling Feinstein’s proposal “phony.”

The United States has suffered an explosion of gun violence over the last three decades, including 62 mass shooting incidents since 1982.

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