Qualla: 2019 Virginia Beach shooting

2019 Virginia Beach shooting: Introduction

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Mojo Hand (talk · contribs) (formerly Kubigula), CC BY-SA 3.0. Friday, May 31, 2019. Building 2 of the Virginia Beach Municipal Center, in the Princess Anne area of the city. The renovations underway in the building meant that when the first shots started, some of the people inside thought it was a nail gun. The shooter was a forty-year-old engineer in the city's public utilities department named DeWayne Craddock, who that morning had emailed his resignation to management and then driven to work armed. He killed twelve people, wounded four others, hit a responding police officer in his ballistic vest, and died in a prolonged exchange of gunfire with the officers who reached him. It was the second-deadliest workplace shooting in U.S. history. It is the deadliest mass shooting in Virginia since the one at Virginia Tech in 2007. The names of the twelve who died were these:

Image: Mojo Hand (talk · contribs) (formerly Kubigula) | CC BY-SA 3.0

2019 Virginia Beach shooting: The Twelve

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Serge Melki from Indianapolis, USA, CC BY 2.0. Laquita C. Brown, a right-of-way agent in public works, had worked for the city for four and a half years. Tara Welch Gallagher, an engineer in public works, had been with the city for six years. Mary Louise Gayle, a right-of-way agent in public works, had given the city twenty-f...

Image: Serge Melki from Indianapolis, USA | CC BY 2.0

2019 Virginia Beach shooting: The Day Itself

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit lifesizepotato from San Antonio, TX, CC0. Craddock shot a woman in a car in the parking lot of Building 2 first, then one person on the steps, before entering the building and moving through all three floors. He had two semi-automatic .45 pistols - a Glock 21 and an H&K USP Compact Tactical with a suppressor - and multip...

Image: lifesizepotato from San Antonio, TX | CC0

2019 Virginia Beach shooting: Ryan Cox

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Lago Mar, CC BY-SA 4.0. One detail from that afternoon: Ryan Keith Cox, the account clerk, helped move colleagues into an office and barricaded the door to keep the shooter out. He was killed when he went back into the hallway to help more people get to safety. A bass-baritone singer in his church choir...

Image: Lago Mar | CC BY-SA 4.0

2019 Virginia Beach shooting: The Building

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kubigula (talk), CC BY-SA 3.0. Building 2 was a working municipal office. Engineers worked there. The people designing the water system for the city of Virginia Beach worked there. People came in to get permits and to do business with their local government. Six of the eleven employees who were killed worked a...

Image: Kubigula (talk) | CC BY-SA 3.0

2019 Virginia Beach shooting: What Comes After

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit PumpkinSky, CC BY-SA 3.0. Members of the Courthouse Community United Methodist Church showed up at the scene to feed the police once it was secured. They named the killer once and never again. The Virginia Beach Police Department and city government adopted the same practice: they spoke the names of the v...

Image: PumpkinSky | CC BY-SA 3.0