(updated) Gunman Kills 4 at Ohio Heavy Metal Show

[boogieordie]

Thought some of you guys might want to know this

Gunman Kills 4 at Ohio Heavy Metal Show

15 minutes ago

By JAY COHEN, Associated Press Writer

COLUMBUS, Ohio - A gunman charged onstage at a packed nightclub and opened fire on the band and crowd, killing top heavy metal guitarist "Dimebag" Darrell Abbott and three other people before a police officer shot him to death, authorities and witnesses said.

Police spokeswoman Sherry Mercurio identified three of the victims of Wednesday's shooting as Abbott, who played for the Texas-based band Damageplan, and two other men, Nathan Bray, 23; and Erin Halk, 29.

She identified the gunman as Nathan Gale, 25, of Marysville, 25 miles northwest of Columbus. Police said they had no information on a motive or any connection to the band.

The gunman had a hostage in a headlock and seemed to be preparing to kill him when the officer, James D. Niggemeyer, managed to shoot without injuring the hostage, police said.

Damageplan had just begun its first song at Alrosa Villa club when the man shot Abbott five or six times at point-blank range, a witness said.

Abbott, 38, one of metal's top guitarists, and his brother, Damageplan drummer Vinnie Paul Abbott, were members of Pantera, the Grammy-nominated thrash-rock pioneer that enjoyed wide popularity in the 1990s.

The witness, 22-year-old Chris Couch, said he was standing about 30 feet from the stage when he saw a man wearing a hooded sweat shirt walk up to the stage, followed by a bouncer and another club employee.

The man in the sweat shirt climbed onto the stage, started yelling and opened fire on the guitarist, then shot a bouncer who pulled him off the musician, Couch said.

Police spokesman Sgt. Brent Mull said that after shooting at band members, the gunman fired into the crowd. Niggemeyer, patrolling nearby, arrived within two minutes, he said.

"If the officer wasn't as close as he was, I think this would have been a lot worse," Mull said. "It was a chaotic scene, just a horrific scene."

Niggemeyer, 31, entered the club through a back door and was directed to the stage, where he saw one person lying dead and the suspect holding onto another "pretty much in a headlock," Mull said.

"The officer was able to strategically gun this guy down before he was able to kill this hostage," Mull said. He said the hostage, "probably a fan, maybe someone who worked with the band," was able to maneuver out of the way somewhat before the officer fired.

Mull said he believed there was amateur video that officers could view for clues.

The name of the fifth person killed was not immediately released. Mercurio said family members were still being notified.

Thursday morning, a dozen yellow roses, still in plastic wrap, lay near the entry to the low-slung beige building that since 1974 has hosted mostly heavy metal acts. The 641-person-capacity club, just off a freeway exit on the city's north side, sits amid motels, small businesses and office complexes.

After the shooting began, Couch and a friend headed for the exit along with a tide of hundreds of fans.

"It was definitely a grudge. It was against something," Couch said.

Amanda Stankus, 19, who attended the show with Couch, said she initially thought the shooting was part of the show. "I just saw the guitarist fall down, and we decided to get out of there," she said.

The Abbott brothers produced Damageplan's debut album, "New Found Power," which was released in February. Other band members are vocalist Patrick Lachman and bassist Bob Zilla.

"Damageplan carries on the tradition Pantera started, the ... hell-raising tradition we were all about," Vinnie Paul Abbott told The Dallas Morning News in October. "We do play some Pantera songs. Me and Dime wrote them, and we feel like we have the right to play them. But the focus is on Damageplan.

"It took awhile for some of the Pantera fans to accept it; we knew that was gonna be the case," he said. "Change is something that people have a hard time accepting. But me and Dime intended on doing this our whole lives."

A message left with Atlantic Records Group, which oversees Damageplan's label Elektra, was not immediately returned.

Damageplan's Web site said Darrel and Vinnie Abbott grew up in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, where their father, country songwriter Jerry Abbott, owned a recording studio.

Telephone numbers for Darrell and Jerry Abbott are unlisted and could not be reached early Thursday by The Associated Press.

Pantera, known for its fast, aggressive sound, recorded several albums in the 1990s, attracting a massive cult following. The third release, "Far Beyond Driven," debuted at No. 1 in 1994, surprising chart-watchers and critics alike. Other hit albums were "The Great Southern Trendkill" and "Reinventing The Steel." A song by the band became the Dallas Stars hockey team's signature tune in 1999.

Pantera was nominated for Grammies for best metal performance in 1995 for "I'm Broken" and in 2001 for "Revolution Is My Name."

The video "The Best of Pantera: Far Beyond the Great Southern Cowboys' Vulgar Hits" hit the top 10 for music-video sales earlier this year; another video, "3-Watch It Go," hit the top 10 in 1998.

The shootings came exactly 24 years after John Lennon was shot to death outside his New York apartment building by a deranged fan.

Dozens of messages were posted to the Dallas band's Web site after the shootings.

"This is the worst day in metal history," one posting read.

"The metal world feels your pain," another wrote.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...tclub_shooting

[sxesven]

what the ****ing **** **** **** **** mother****er my ****ing god what the ****

This is very depressing news, excuse my language. I honestly can't believe this.

I can't.

[Minimum_Payne]

damn bastard! anyone seen the pic of the gunman? he looks like some druggie or some mentally retarded sick freak.

Anyways...RIP Dimebag.

[paper_doll]

O_O Holy crap... Why do ppl do this?!

[Coelacanth]

Yeah, that gunman is screwed up...

Poor guys...

RIP

[boogieordie]

With the gunman dead we may never know why this happened.

I didn't listen to those bands, but that's still really messed up.

[bulmasman]

Yup, it's messed up when anyone dies. It's sad for the fans, but mostly it must be heart breaking for the families

[luminaire]

It's crazy. Why do things have to be so screwed up?

My condolences to the families of those who got killed. RIP.

[isaac hiew]

I don't listen to metal. But such killing really does make me feel disgusted. I don't really know why this man went on rampage and kill innocent people, that is a humilliation to the music itself. God bless those who were killed.

[openingRUN]

[Peruvian_Sky]

This news floored me when I heard it this morning. Dimebag was one of the guitarists who made me want to play guitar. He was an influence on me as a guitarist. He will be surely missed.

[MTRLevolution]

dimebag was a badass. pantera was cool. this is pretty ****** news.

[boogieordie]

Shooting Suspect Obsessed With Pantera
(AP, 12/10/2004 12:53 PM)

By Jay Cohen

The man who shot former Pantera guitarist "Dimebag" Darrell Abbott and three other men to death at a nightclub was obsessed with the popular heavy metal band and made bizarre accusations against it, a onetime friend said in reports published Friday.

Jeramie Brey said gunman Nathan Gale once showed up at a friend's house saying he wanted to share songs he had written. The pages of lyrics were copied from Pantera, but Gale claimed he had written them, Brey said.

"He was off his rocker," Brey told The Columbus Dispatch. "He said they were his songs, that Pantera stole them from him and that he was going to sue them."

He later told Brey that he planned to sue Pantera for stealing his identity. Brey and friend Dave Johnson said Gale's behavior frightened them and they distanced themselves from him several years ago. But other friends said they never considered Gale capable of violence.

On Wednesday night, the 25-year-old former Marine charged the stage at a show by Abbott's new band, Damageplan, and gunned down four people including Abbott before a policeman fatally shot him.

Police said Friday they still didn't know Gale's motive, and they may never find out. Some witnesses said Gale yelled accusations that the revered guitarist broke up Pantera, but police had not verified those reports.

An imposing figure at 6-foot-3, Gale had made people uneasy even at the tattoo parlor, staring and locking them into conversations about heavy metal music. When he played offensive line for the semi-pro Lima Thunder football team, he psyched himself up before games by piping Pantera into his headphones, coach Mark Green said.

But Green had not pegged Gale as the type to go on a shooting rampage.

"It wasn't like he was a loner," Green said.

Gale had had minor run-ins with police since 1997 but wasn't considered a troublemaker, according to police in his hometown of Marysville, 25 miles northwest of Columbus.

Gale had served with the 2nd Marine Division at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina until November 2003, when he was discharged after less than half of the typical four-year stint, Marine spokeswoman Gunnery Sgt. Kristine Scarber said. She declined to explain the discharge, citing privacy rules.

A few hours before the shooting, Gale had showed up at Marysville's Bears Den Tattoo Studio, where often he stared at people and forced them into conversations, manager Lucas Bender said.

"He comes in here and likes to hang out when he's not wanted," Bender said. "The most pointless conversations."

On Wednesday he asked about having the studio order tattoo equipment for him, tattoo artist Bo Toler said. Toler told him no, and Gale got angry and started yelling, he said.

"Last night was actually the first time I noticed his temper," Toler said.

No one answered the door Thursday at the Marysville home of Gale's mother, Mary Clark. A message left on her cell phone was not returned.

The violence at the smoke-filled Alrosa Villa club came just after the opening notes by Damageplan, the band formed by Abbott and his brother, drummer Vinnie Paul Abbott, after they left Pantera. Gale dodged two band members, grabbed Darrell Abbott and shot him at least five times in the head, witnesses and police said.

In less than five minutes, Gale had also killed Erin Halk, 29, a club employee who loaded band equipment; fan Nathan Bray, 23, of nearby Grove City; and band bodyguard Jeff Thompson, 40.

Two other band employees, Chris Paluska and John Brooks, remained in a hospital Friday morning with undisclosed injuries. Paluska was listed in good condition and Brooks in serious condition.

On 911 tapes released by authorities, one caller said, "I heard quite a few gunshots and I think somebody in the band definitely has been shot."

A short time later a man called and said: "He's on stage right now. He's got a gun." A moment later, the man said, "He just shot again," and then, "He's got a gun to somebody's head."

Despite a drizzle and temperatures in the 40s, more than 200 people turned up for a vigil Thursday night in the club's parking lot.

Shawn Sweeney, 22, played "old-school Pantera" on an acoustic guitar as a half-dozen young men held a blue tarp over his head and sang along as a crowd gathered.

"This is beautiful, this is absolutely beautiful," Sweeney said.

___

On the Net:

http://www.damageplan.com

http://www.pantera.com

Another article here -
http://launch.yahoo.com/read/news.asp?contentID=220481

[Rainmaker]

..i can't ****ing believe this.

just.. what the ****.