Owings Mills Man Killed In Montgomery County Triple Shooting

BROOKEVILLE, MD — An Owings Mills man was among those killed in a triple fatal shooting Monday in Montgomery County that stemmed from a domestic disturbance. The gunman allegedly kept his wife captive in their home over the weekend and when she escaped to a neighbor's house Monday afternoon, he followed her and shot and killed three people.

The victims have been identified as a neighbor, a contractor working on the neighbor's house and a neighbor's out-of-town guest.

Craig Harold Shotwell, 54, of Wards Chapel Road in Owings Mills, was among the deceased. Police said he was performing work at the residence located at 22002 Brown Farm Way at the time of the deadly rampage.

The other two victims were Mary Ann Olson, 66, who lived in the home at 22002 Brown Farm Way, and Danny Lee Murphy, 70, of East Spearfish Drive in Brandon, South Dakota, who was visiting.

The suspected gunman — Christopher Wilson Snyder, 41 — killed himself after a standoff, Montgomery County Police said late Monday evening.

Authorities reported to the scene at a home in the 22000 block of Brown Farm Way, east of Sunshine, at about 3:44 p.m. on Monday.

The call was for a "domestic disturbance with initial report of multiple people shot" inside the home with multiple fatalities, police said. Residents were then urged to shelter in place as officers sought the gunman.

After the shootings, Snyder held police off for several hours as he hid out in his house across the street.

Negotiators spoke to him by phone in an effort to get him to surrender, and he was reportedly talking to negotiators when a tactical team broke through the front door of his home around 11 p.m.

Snyder asked police if they had just broken in the front door of his home, then hung up the phone. Tactical officers heard a single gunshot, police said, and found Snyder dead from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Montgomery County Police Chief Thomas Manger said that the department has "had contact with this suspect in the past over a number of different issues."

A nearby resident told The Washington Post that Snyder was a "nut case." He said that Snyder had come to his farm for target shooting with friends.

"I just didn't care for the guy," Todd Greenstone told The Post. "We do good, clean, honest shooting, some skeet shooting. He came loaded for bear."

"I asked him not to come back to the farm," Greenstone said.

Police said Tuesday afternoon that Snyder's wife, who has not been identified, told detectives she had been held against her will by Snyder over the weekend at home. She managed to escape to her neighbor's home at 22002 Brown Farm Way.

When Snyder's wife ran to her neighbor's for help, Snyder apparently followed and fired the fatal gunshots.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

- By Cam Luttrell

Image via Shutterstock.