We love you, Alison and Adam. pic.twitter.com/hLSzQi06XE
— WDBJ7 (@WDBJ7) August 26, 2015This is a breaking story. We'll continue to update as it develops.
A TV anchor and a camera operator were shot and killed during a live broadcast Wednesday morning in central Virginia, local police report. The two victims have been identified by local news station WDBJ as Alison Parker, a 24-year-old reporter, and cameraman Adam Ward, 27. The shooting suspect, identified as Vester Lee Flanagan II, shot himself after fleeing police. He initially survived but later died from his injuries Wednesday. Flanagan, 41, went by the name Bryce Williams, and worked at the station, before being fired in 2013. A Twitter account with that name was updated Wednesday after the crime, seemingly by the shooting suspect; tweets criticized the two victims and boasted that the person tweeting had filmed and posted a video the shooting himself. The Twitter account was quickly suspended and the identity of the account's owner has not been confirmed.
A TV anchor and a camera operator were shot and killed during a live broadcast Wednesday morning in central Virginia, local police report. The two victims have been identified by local news station WDBJ as Alison Parker, a 24-year-old reporter, and cameraman Adam Ward, 27. The shooting suspect, identified as Vester Lee Flanagan II, shot himself after fleeing police. He initially survived but later died from his injuries Wednesday. Flanagan, 41, went by the name Bryce Williams, and worked at the station, before being fired in 2013. A Twitter account with that name was updated Wednesday after the crime, seemingly by the shooting suspect; tweets criticized the two victims and boasted that the person tweeting had filmed and posted a video the shooting himself. The Twitter account was quickly suspended and the identity of the account's owner has not been confirmed.
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Jeffrey Marks, the general manager of WDBJ expressed his admiration for the two dead in a broadcast on the station Wednesday. "I cannot tell you how much [Parker and Ward] were loved by the WDBJ7 team," he said. Parker and Ward were filming a morning broadcast at 6:45 a.m. when a gunman open-fired, reports WDBJ7, the Roanoke, VA-based CBS affiliate where the two worked. CNN reports that a third victim, who was being interviewed at the time of the attack, was shot in the back and is currently being treated. She's reported to be in stable condition. Both the victims were reported to be dating or engaged to colleagues at the TV station. Chris Hurst, also an anchor according to his social media profiles, took to Twitter to share that he'd been dating Parker. "We were together almost nine months. It was the best nine months of our lives. We wanted to get married. We just celebrated her 24th birthday," he wrote.
We were together almost nine months. It was the best nine months of our lives. We wanted to get married.We just celebrated her 24th birthday
— Chris Hurst (@chrishurstwdbj) August 26, 2015Ward, the cameraman, was reportedly engaged to a photographer at the station, Melissa Ott. CNN's Brian Stelter reports that she witnessed the shooting from the control room.