Two employees were killed and another critically injured after a fellow employee opened fire Friday morning at a warehouse in central Illinois.
Springfield police Chief Kenny Winslow said the shooting happened at a Bunn-O-Matic facility on 1400 Stevenson Drive, Springfield shortly after 11am.
The building was evacuated and SWAT combed through the warehouse, when they found two individuals with gunshot wounds inside the building while a third was found injured in the parking lot.
Two men, one in his 20s and another in his 60s both died in the shooting, while the third victim, a woman in her 50s was rushed to a nearby hospital.
The authorities have not released the names of the said victims.
Springfield Police Commander Brian Oakes said at a news briefing Friday afternoon. “We’re still searching for a suspect. It is doubtful the suspect is still at the scene, but we are acting as if.”
He added that it would take some time to complete the search, noting, “If you’ve never been in this facility, it is a very large facility.”
Later in the day the sheriff of nearby Morgan County called the chief’s office and reported that the suspect had been found fatally shot in his car.
Winslow identified the shooter as Michael L. Collins, a 48-year-old from Springfield.
The chief said Collins knew all of his victims, but refused to discuss neither a possible motive nor the reason of the suspect’s death.
The authorities are yet to confirm whether Collins had a criminal record in the past, but Oakes said that the investigation is in its infancy stage, and that the area remains closed off.
The FBI, Illinois State Police, Springfield Police Department, and Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office were among the several agencies who responded to the scene.
Bunn-O-Matic, a part of Bunn Corp., manufactured dispensed beverage equipment and is headquartered in Springfield.