Museum Shooter Charged With Murder

Slain guard opened door as courtesy to von Brunn, 88
By Matt Cantor,  Newser Staff
Posted Jun 11, 2009 1:49 PM CDT
Museum Shooter Charged With Murder
An FBI investigator works at the doors of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington today, a day after a shooting left a security officer dead and the gunman wounded.   (AP Photo)

The suspect in yesterday’s Holocaust Museum shooting has been charged with murder, the AP reports, and could face the death penalty; hate-crime charges are also possible. Slain security guard Stephen Johns was opening the door for James von Brunn when the 88-year-old fatally shot him, CNN adds; guards fired back and wounded von Brunn.

Questions linger over whether, as a convicted felon, von Brunn should have owned a rifle at all. Police have called for a probe into the weapon’s source. A “couple of thousand” people were in the museum when the attack occurred yesterday, said an official. That night, a play about racism victims Anne Frank and Emmett Till was to be performed at the museum; von Brunn has called Frank’s diary a hoax. (More James Von Brunn stories.)

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