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Fired employee kills one, injures four others in Walmart distribution center shooting

Arriving officers engaged in a shootout with the suspect, who was killed in exchange of fire and later pronounced dead at a hospital.
Image: Walmart Distribution Center shooting
Scene outside the Walmart Distribution Center in Red Bluff, Calif., on June 28, 2020.KVNN

A former Walmart employee killed one person and injured four others in a shooting Saturday at a Walmart distribution center in Northern California.

Louis Wesley Lane, 31, was let go from the distribution center last year and died after exchanging 20 to 30 rounds with officers who responded to the shooting, Tehama County Assistant Sheriff Phil Johnston said Sunday, according to NBC Bay Area. Lane was fired in February 2019 after failing to show up for work, Johnston said.

No motive has been identified in the shooting.

The shooter circled the center's parking lot in a vehicle before crashing into the building, getting out and opening fire with a semiautomatic rifle, Lt. Yvette Borden of the Tehama County Sheriff's Office, previously said.

Chief Kyle Sanders of the Red Bluff Police Department said the first officers at the scene, who arrived before Tehama deputies, engaged in a shootout with the suspect and struck him.

"After arriving, a male adult shot at one or more of the officers multiple times," he said in a statement. "One Red Bluff Police officer and one sergeant used their duty rifles and shot at the suspect, ultimately stopping the threat."

Allison Hendrickson, spokeswoman for St. Elizabeth Community Hospital in Red Bluff, said two people died and four others were in fair condition at the facility. Authorities clarified Sunday that one of those who died at the hospital was Lane.

The deceased victim was identified as Martin Haro-Lozano, 45, of Orland, California. It's unclear whether he had any relationship to Lane.

A witness told KNVN in Chico that he saw the vehicle crash into the building and erupt in flames.

"I was only worried about the people that were injured by the car into the building," a man at the scene told the station. "I went to help a lady that was kind of trapped at the beginning and at that point, I started hearing gunfire and then, went down to the office and there was more gunfire. I hit the panic alarm and called 911 as soon as I could."

Walmart said in a statement that it would assist the sheriff's office with the investigation.

"We are deeply saddened by this tragic incident," the company said.