Fatal Rampage at Nursery Blamed on Gunman’s Anger Over Accident

A gunman who killed three people at a nursery before taking his own life harbored a grudge over an insurance settlement resulting from an accident with the owners’ daughter, the gunman’s brother said.

Mark Fredrick Cleaver, 40, burst into the house of Douglas and Junkjo Nakashima, owners of Nakashima Nurseries, early Thursday after throwing a dud grenade through a window and shooting off a lock, said Sheriff’s Deputy Bill Cassara.

Cleaver, dressed in camouflage fatigues and carrying a shotgun, an automatic pistol and a revolver, killed Junkjo Nakashima, 48, as she slept, Cassara said.

He wounded her husband, who ran out the back door and into the main cutting room of the flower nursery, where 12 people were working. Two workers, Jose Sanguino and Miguel Lomeli, were killed in a barrage of gunfire. Five others, including Douglas Nakashima and his father, were wounded.

Cleaver shot himself in the head before deputies arrived.

Cleaver held a grudge over injuries he suffered in a 1989 auto accident with the Nakashimas’ daughter Laura, then 16, said Yulee Turner, Cleaver’s half-brother.

According to police reports, Cleaver was a passenger in a car that was hit by Laura Nakashima as she pulled out of the family’s driveway. He went through the windshield, cracking vertebrae in his neck and suffering head and knee injuries.

The teen-ager, who had just received her driver’s license, was cited for failure to yield, said Officer Ted Swain of the California Highway Patrol. Cleaver filed a lawsuit against the family.

“He wasn’t on an even keel,” said attorney Greg McDougall, who represented Cleaver. “I think he had a chip on his shoulder.”

McDougall said Thursday he settled the case for “between $30,000 and $50,000” with Nakashima’s insurance company. After attorney’s fees and medical expenses, Cleaver was left with $14,000.

“All his anger was directed toward those people,” Turner said. “I guess today he ran out of the $14,000. He just cracked.”