Reno hospital gunman kills 1, injures 2

LAS VEGAS — A gunman opened fire at a Reno hospital complex Tuesday, killing at least one person and critically wounding two others before taking his own life, state emergency officials said.

One of the wounded was reported to be a doctor.

The shooting occurred on the third floor of a medical building at Renown Regional Medical Center, Reno Deputy Police Chief Tom Robinson said. He estimated that about 100 people were inside the building at the time.

Robinson had no information on a possible motive but said he didn’t think the shooting was happenstance.

“I wouldn’t say they were targeted, but I don’t think it was just random,” he told reporters.

Witnesses described chaos at the hospital campus after the gunman walked into the Center for Advanced Medicine, which is in a building on the medical center campus but is unaffiliated with the hospital.

Pictures broadcast on Reno television showed police SWAT team members going through the building and other officers running toward the scene.

The shooting was first reported at 2:05 p.m., Robinson said, and officers responded within three to five minutes, searching room by room.

“On the third floor of the building they located two people down and located two people injured and evacuated the injured parties,” he said.

The gunman, whose identity is under investigation, shot himself, Robinson said.

One witness described the shooter as a white male, dressed casually and “a little bit on the tall side.”

Lesley Guerrero, 17, was visiting her grandfather in the intensive-care unit, she said, and was outside when the hospital’s intercom announced a “code black.” From the top of a parking garage, she watched SWAT teams huddle and enter the medical building where the shooting took place, she said, and she saw a “flustered” woman drive up.

“She was looking down at the scene and talking on her phone … and I guess that was her building that the shooting was happening in, and she was very concerned about her employees,” the teenager said. The woman rushed back inside the hospital. When Lesley came inside too, she passed three doctors huddled together, one of whom was crying, she said.

The wounded victims were in surgery, including one who is a doctor, Nevada Department of Public Safety spokeswoman Gail Powell told the Associated Press. Both were in critical condition, said Angelo Rambo, a Renown public affairs officer.

Neither a Reno spokeswoman nor the hospital would confirm that the injured included a doctor.

Kandy Hall of Sparks, Nev., told the Reno Gazette-Journal newspaper that she was in the waiting room at Urology Nevada when the gunman came in about 2 p.m. and looked right at her.

“This man came through the door into the waiting room with [a gun] at his side,” she said. “He pointed it at me and then he brandished it at everyone else that was sitting against the wall, and he said something like, ‘Everybody get out of here,’ or ‘You’d all better get out of here.’ Then he opened the door to go back to where the doctor and the nurses were.”

Hall said the receptionists and medical staff began shouting: “He’s got a gun. He’s got a gun. Get out of here.”

“So everyone started to run for the doors and cramming everyone into the elevators,” she said.

Reno-area resident John Reid told the Gazette-Journal that he hurried to the hospital after his wife, Carlotta, who works there, called him crying after hearing the shots and seeing the gunman walk past her.

“She was in pure panic,” he said.

Eventually Reid saw his wife near the shooting scene, escorted by Washoe County sheriff’s deputies, he said.

Nevada state Sen. Debbie Smith, who was at the medical center campus when the shots erupted, was one of those kept under lockdown until police cleared the scene. “Everyone here at Renown is impatient about being on lockdown but I would rather be safe,” she wrote on Twitter. “There are still SWAT members roaming the halls.”

The campus was on lockdown all afternoon, but by 4:15 p.m., TV video showed hospital workers walking away.

Reno city spokeswoman Sharon Spangler said several witnesses had been taken to Reno police headquarters for questioning. “The police say they’ve entered the investigative phase of this incident,” she said.

She added that officials had yet to notify relatives of the dead and injured and were not releasing identities. “What we do know is there are no more outstanding suspects,” she said.

Robinson told reporters late Tuesday that the bodies were still where they fell. “They are in the middle of a crime scene,” he said. “We’re in the middle of an investigation, and we don’t want to compromise that by rushing up to identify them.”

Jan Tors, a spokesman for the University of Nevada, whose school of medicine has offices where the shooting occurred, issued a news release just after 4:30 p.m., saying all students and faculty members were safe.

“We are relieved to report [University of Nevada School of Medicine] officials have received confirmation that all UNSOM faculty and staff at that location are accounted for and safe,” she wrote. “Reno Police Department and Renown Health have issued notices confirming the threat is clear.”

Late in the day, Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) reacted to the shooting on Twitter.

“Saddened by tragic shooting at Reno’s Renown Regional Medical Center,” he wrote. “My heart goes out to the victims and their families.”

john.glionna@latimes.com

matt.pearce@latimes.com