Suspect Charged in Courthouse Shooting Spree

Lawyer George Lott was ordered held on bail of $1,325,000 Thursday after being charged with capital murder and deadly assault in the shooting spree at a Ft. Worth courtroom Wednesday.

Lott, 45, saying he was despondent about his divorce 2 1/2 years ago and his pending trial on child sexual-assault charges, surrendered at WFAA-TV in Dallas about six hours after the incident. There, he said in a taped interview that he had to do “a very horrible thing” to draw attention to wrongs he said the legal system had done to him.

Two lawyers were killed, two judges were hospitalized with bullet wounds and another lawyer was grazed by a bullet after a spectator opened fire with a handgun as a three-judge panel of the 2nd Judicial District Court of Appeals met at Tarrant County Courthouse, authorities said.

Interviews with court authorities, lawyers and neighbors produced scattered details about Lott and indicated that he was frustrated by the handling of his divorce and by child-molestation charges brought by his former wife.

Records show that Lott was divorced from Margo Livesay in January, 1990, and that a jury awarded her custody of their son, Neal, now 4. Lott told television reporters that his appeal of the divorce decree had been denied in the 2nd District courtroom and that he knew none of the shooting victims.

Lott remains in Tarrant County jail, where Sheriff Tim Minter said he will stay until a trial date is set. He also is charged with carrying a weapon in a place where weapons are prohibited. The capital murder count carries a possible death penalty.