The man who shot and killed a guard at a Manhattan federal building on Saturday before committing suicide got a "raw deal" when he was fired from his government job 17 years earlier a congressman told the The Associated Press.
New Jersey congressman Bill Pascrell shed the faintest amount of light on a possible motive in the attack by explaining that the shooter, Kevin Downing, was fired from the NYC office of the Bureau of Labor Statistics back in 1999 and had been fighting to prove he was wrongly terminated ever since.
Pascrell had been helping Downing with his case and had reportedly wrote a letter to the Labor Department saying it appeared the man had been fired as payback for blowing the whistle on some alleged wrongdoing in the office.
“There is evidence to indicate Mr Downing’s termination was inappropriate because it was in retaliation for his communication with congressional staff regarding what he believed to be waste and abuse present in the Bureau of Labor Statistics,” the letter said.
The investigation is ongoing and agents have been at Downing's home in Fort Lee, New Jersey to search for more answers.
