Suspect Dead After Killing 2 During Live Television Interview

Long before Vester Flanagan opened fire on a WDBJ television reporter and her cameraman, there were multiple flags about the gunman’s stability.

Flanagan used the name “Bryce Williams” on camera at WDBJ in Roanoke, Va. He was warned several times about other employees feeling threatened by his action, and instructed to seek counseling during one performance review. In his own suicide note, penned more than two years after he was fired, Flanagan said he was mad enough to kill.

On Wednesday morning, he acted — on live television.

At 6:45 a.m., Adam Ward, 27, was shooting a live interview at Bridgewater Plaza at Smith Mountain Lake. Alison Parker, 24, was interviewing a business leader on a deck by the lake.

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A video of the broadcast shows the two women focused on their conversation and a cameraman doing his job, until the sound of several gunshots. The camera falls to the ground and cries are heard. Patch has chosen not to post that video.

Ward and Parker died at the scene. Vicki Gardner, head of the Smith Mountain Lake Chamber of Commerce, was shot in the back, but she is expected to recover.

Hours later, the gunman posted his own video of the shootings on Facebook and Twitter accounts attributed to Bryce Williams. The accounts, which were quickly suspended Wednesday morning, also included statements critical of the victims.

He sent an ”often rambling” 23-page letter in a fax at 8:28 a.m. to ABC News. The letter spoke to Flanagan’s motives.

“Yes, it will sound like I am angry...I am,” Flanagan’s suicide letter said. “And I have every right to be. But when I leave this Earth, the only emotion I want to feel is peace....”

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Flanagan’s personal car was found shortly before 11 a.m. at Roanoke Regional Airport, according to Sheriff Overton. Investigators were able to determine Flanagan was using a Chevrolet Sonic he had rented earlier in the month.

They were able to determine the vehicle was heading north on Interstate 81, Overton said. Near 11:30 a.m. a Virginia State trooper using a license plate reader identified the car on I-66 in Fauquier County, heading toward Washington, D.C.

The driver would not pull over, according to Virginia State Police spokeswoman Corinne Geller. “Minutes later, the suspect vehicle ran off the road and crashed,” she said. “The troopers approached the vehicle and found the male driver suffering from a gunshot wound.”

Flanagan was pronounced dead at 1:26 p.m. at Inova Fairfax Hospital, according to Franklin County Sheriff Bill Overton.

Overton was watching the live broadcast Wednesday morning when the shooting occurred. He’d just done his own interview with Parker and Ward a few weeks ago.

”I couldn’t understand what was happening, myself, at that time,” he said during an afternoon news conference.

Parker had recently moved in with her boyfriend, WDBJ anchor Chris Hurst.

“I am numb,” Hurst wrote in messages on Twitter, noting that Parker had recently celebrated her birthday. “She worked with Adam every day. They were a team.”

Ward was engaged to a producer at the television station and the couple was preparing for a move to Charlotte, N.C.

Jeff Marks, the general manager of WDBJ, called Flanagan “an unhappy man,” during the noon newscast. “He had a reputation as someone difficult to work with,” he said.

Flanagan was fired in 2013 due to anger issues, Marks said. Complaints made by Flanagan after he was fired were dismissed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, according to Marks.

Photo: Victims from WDBJ7 on Twitter. Image of shooter from broadcast footage, Franklin County Sheriff’s Office.