A gunman killed two bailiffs and injured a deputy sheriff at a county courthouse in St. Joseph, Michigan, authorities said Monday.
“The suspect has been shot and killed,” Sheriff L. Paul Bailey said at a news conference.
Bailey said the incident began after a disturbance shortly before 2:30 p.m.
The Michigan State Police said they responded to the shooting Monday afternoon. Gov. Rick Snyder posted on Twitter at 3:30 p.m. that the state police have “secured the scene at the Berrien County courthouse and started its investigation into the shooting that occurred this afternoon.”
Video footage posted online that appeared to be from outside the courthouse in southwestern Michigan showed a line of police vehicles with their lights flashing parked outside the building.
Chris Gautz, a spokesman for the Michigan Department of Corrections, which operates a probation office in the courthouse, said one of their employees was in a third-floor courtroom at the time of the shooting and saw the gunman.
“We had a probation officer in the courtroom when it happened, and the gunman ran right past him and the rest of the folks,” Gautz said in a telephone interview. He said the courtroom remained on lockdown.
Gautz said that the probation office’s staff were all secure and none were injured or killed in the shooting.
The courthouse is located about 50 miles west of Kalamazoo, where an Uber driver killed six people in a shooting spree earlier this year.