A television station found itself at the center of a news story Monday when an intruder was shot as he entered the lobby of a badge-secured facility that’s home to WTTG. A security guard working at the DC-area television station shot an unidentified man in the building’s lobby about 3 p.m. Monday. Surveillance video shows him breaking the glass of two doors and entering the building. NBC Washington News 4 reported that a source told them the suspect told officers he wanted the Fox station to get in contact with President Donald Trump, but Police Commander Melvin Gresham stated in a press conference about the incident that he was not able to confirm or deny that possible motive.
The 38-year-old male suspect broke through two glass doors to enter the building located on Wisconsin Avenue in Friendship Heights near Washington, D.C. Video surveillance appears to show him wearing a red sweatshirt and blue jeans as he kicked in the glass doors then ducking below a steel bar on the door to gain entry to the building. He then encountered a second set of glass doors and proceeded to kick in the glass on them as well.
Just In: A man was trying to get into WTTG, the local Fox station, on Wisconsin Avenue NW and broke out a window to the studios, and the security guard shot him. https://t.co/FMV21ESlem
— NBC4 Washington (@nbcwashington) October 22, 2018
The man was first approached in the lobby by a female security officer according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution . She made an attempt to stop the intruder with pepper spray but was not successful. The man was behaving in an aggressive manner when another security guard shot him in the upper torso inside the television station’s lobby. The identity of the guards involved in the situation has not been released. The intruder was not armed and no one else was injured. Police are currently retrieving additional film from surveillance cameras in the area to obtain more information on exactly what happened before and during the incident. ABC News reports that police were familiar with the suspect and that they believe he has a history of mental illness.
Other people working in the building tweeted as the situation unfolded Monday afternoon. Anchor Jim Lokay tweeted, “Sources tell us suspect tried to get into our secure building. Security guards opened fire.” Reporter Lindsay Watts tweeted that the suspect was conscious when he was transported to the hospital by ambulance and called the experience “surreal.” The intruder was taken to George Washington University Hospital about four and a half miles from the television station and is said to be in critical condition.
