The Collier Township shooting, also referred to as the Bridgeville LA Fitness shooting, was a
mass shooting
There is a lack of consensus on how to define a mass shooting. Most terms define a minimum of three or four victims of gun violence (not including the shooter or in an inner city) in a short period of time, although an Australian study from 200 ...
and
murder-suicide that took place on August 4, 2009, in an
LA Fitness
LA Fitness (doing business as LA Fitness International LLC) is an American gym chain with more than 700 clubs across the United States and Canada. The company was formed in 1984 and is based in Irvine, California.
History
LA Fitness was founde ...
health club in
Collier Township, a suburb of
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...
. The attack resulted in four deaths, including that of the perpetrator, who took his own life. Nine other people were injured.
The fitness center is approximately south of Pittsburgh,
in the Great Southern Shopping Center, a strip mall located in the Kirwan Heights section of Collier Township, just outside of the borough of Bridgeville.
Details
The shooting occurred at a women's aerobics class at the LA Fitness center at approximately 8:15 p.m. The shooter entered the class, placed a duffel bag on the ground, turned off the lights, took out two handguns and began firing, police said. According to police, the gunman fired 52 shots with two
Glock
Glock is a brand of polymer- framed, short recoil-operated, locked-breech semi-automatic pistols designed and produced by Austrian manufacturer Glock Ges.m.b.H. The firearm entered Austrian military and police service by 1982 after it was th ...
9×19mm semiautomatic pistol
A pistol is a handgun, more specifically one with the chamber integral to its gun barrel, though in common usage the two terms are often used interchangeably. The English word was introduced in , when early handguns were produced in Europe, an ...
s before committing suicide by shooting himself in the head with a
.45-caliber revolver
A revolver (also called a wheel gun) is a repeating handgun that has at least one barrel and uses a revolving cylinder containing multiple chambers (each holding a single cartridge) for firing. Because most revolver models hold up to six roun ...
.
A
.32-caliber semiautomatic pistol found in his pocket was not used.
Three women and the gunman died, and about nine other people were injured. The
Allegheny County Medical Examiner
The Office of Allegheny County Medical Examiner investigates cases of persons who die within Allegheny County, Pennsylvania from criminal violence by casualty or by suicide, when unattended by a physician; under correctional custody or any other s ...
's office identified the three women who died as Heidi Overmier, 46, of Collier Township; Elizabeth Gannon, 49, of
Green Tree, Pennsylvania; and Jody Billingsley, 38, of
Mt. Lebanon, Pennsylvania.
Perpetrator
George Sodini (September 30, 1960 – August 4, 2009), a 48-year-old
systems analyst
A systems analyst, also known as business technology analyst, is an information technology (IT) professional who specializes in analyzing, designing and implementing information systems. Systems analysts assess the suitability of information syst ...
at the law firm of
K&L Gates
K&L Gates LLP is an American multinational corporation law firm based in the United States, with international offices in Asia, Australia, Europe, the Middle East, and South America. Its namesake firms are Kirkpatrick & Lockhart, a Pittsburgh-ba ...
and a resident of
Scott Township, was identified as the perpetrator. He had written about contemplating carrying out a shooting, which he referred to as the "exit plan",
while also revealing that he "chickened out" of carrying out such a shooting earlier in the year. His website states that he was "never married" and concludes "Death Lives!" Sodini states, "Probably 99% of the people who know me well don't even think I was this crazy." Sodini is reported to have left a note inside the gym bag stating his
hatred for women.
Nearly a week after the murders, it was revealed that Sodini had brought an inert
grenade
A grenade is an explosive weapon typically thrown by hand (also called hand grenade), but can also refer to a shell (explosive projectile) shot from the muzzle of a rifle (as a rifle grenade) or a grenade launcher. A modern hand grenade genera ...
on a
Port Authority
In Canada and the United States, a port authority (less commonly a port district) is a governmental or quasi-governmental public authority for a special-purpose district usually formed by a legislative body (or bodies) to operate ports and other t ...
bus on July 28, 2009. After a passenger sitting next to him notified police, he was questioned about the incident but no charges were filed.
On a website registered in his name, Sodini chronicled over a nine-month period his rejections by women and his severe sexual frustration. "Who knows why? I am not ugly or too weird. No sex since July 1990 either (I was 29)", he writes. "Last time I slept all night with a girlfriend it was 1982. Girls and women don't even give me a second look ANYWHERE". About his problems with women, he wrote: "Women just don't like me. There are 30 million desirable women in the US (my estimate) and I cannot find one". In 2008, Sodini posted online videos, in which he discusses his emotions, along with a tour of his home, the latter which was a homework assignment from "a self-help seminar
ehad attended on how to date women".
TGSCOM Inc., an online gun wholesaler based in
Green Bay, Wisconsin
Green Bay is a city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin. The county seat of Brown County, it is at the head of Green Bay (known locally as "the bay of Green Bay"), a sub-basin of Lake Michigan, at the mouth of the Fox River. It is above sea lev ...
, sold Sodini an empty Glock 9 mm magazine and magazine loading apparatus used in the attack.
TGSCOM sold a used handgun to
Seung-Hui Cho
Seung-Hui Cho (, properly Cho Seung-hui; January 18, 1984 – April 16, 2007) was a Korean-born mass murderer responsible for the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007. Cho killed 32 people and wounded 17 others with two semi-automatic pistols on Apr ...
, who subsequently used it during the 2007
Virginia Tech shooting
The Virginia Tech shooting was a spree shooting that occurred on April 16, 2007, comprising two attacks on the campus of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg, Virginia, United States. Seung-Hui Cho, an u ...
s.
TGSCOM also sold an empty magazine and a holster to Steven Kazmierczak,
who shot and killed five people at
Northern Illinois University
Northern Illinois University (NIU) is a public research university in DeKalb, Illinois. It was founded as Northern Illinois State Normal School on May 22, 1895, by Illinois Governor John P. Altgeld as part of an expansion of the state's system ...
in 2008.
TGSCOM closed in 2012, having become the subject of investigations by the
U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Wisconsin
Better Business Bureau
Better Business Bureau (BBB) is a private, 501(c)(6) nonprofit organization founded in 1912. BBB's self-described mission is to focus on advancing marketplace trust, consisting of 97 independently incorporated local BBB organizations in the Unit ...
, and Green Bay police.
On August 18, it was revealed that Sodini bequeathed his estate, valued at $225,000, to his
alma mater the
University of Pittsburgh
The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a public state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The university is composed of 17 undergraduate and graduate schools and colleges at its urban Pittsburgh campus, home to the universit ...
.
A spokesperson for the university stated that it had "no interest in receiving any such distribution" and requested that it go to the victims and the victims' families.
In March 2012, State Farm Fire and Casualty Co. filed a legal motion attempting to preemptively seek exemption from liability under Sodini's $100,000 personal liability policy. Victims of the shooting claim that the insurance company neglected to ensure Sodini got mental health care.
Aftermath
200px, Flowers and remembrances left at the scene of the August 4, 2009 murder
On August 6, 2009, approximately 75 people, including friends, women's rights advocates, clergy members, and local officials, held a vigil at the
Pittsburgh City-County Building
The Pittsburgh City-County Building is the seat of government for the City of Pittsburgh, and houses both Pittsburgh and Allegheny County offices. It is located in Downtown Pittsburgh at 414 Grant Street, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Built from 1 ...
in downtown Pittsburgh in honor of the shooting's victims. In the aftermath, some feminist groups attributed misogyny and toxic masculinity as a contributing factor. George Sodini has since widely been discussed online by the
incel movement.
See also
*
List of rampage killers in the United States
This section of the list of rampage killers contains those cases that occurred in the United States.
This section does not include school massacres; workplace killings; religious, political or racial crimes; or mass murders that took place p ...
*
2014 Isla Vista killings
The 2014 Isla Vista killings were a series of misogynistic terror attacks in Isla Vista, California. On the evening of May 23, 22-year-old Elliot Rodger
killed six people and injured fourteen others—by gunshot, stabbing and vehicle ramm ...
*
2018 Tallahassee shooting
On November 2, 2018, a mass shooting occurred at Tallahassee Hot Yoga, a yoga studio located in Tallahassee, Florida. The gunman, identified as Scott Paul Beierle, shot six women, two of them fatally, and pistol-whipped a man before killing hims ...
References
External links
George Sodini's Blog: Full Text By Alleged Gym Shooter(at
ABC News
ABC News is the news division of the American broadcast network ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast ''ABC World News Tonight, ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other programs include Breakfast television, morning ...
-website)
George Sodini'sYouTube
YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...
channel
{{DEFAULTSORT:Collier Township Shooting, 2009
History of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania
Crimes in Pittsburgh
Collier Township shooting
2009 mass shootings in the United States
Mass shootings in the United States
Massacres of women
Murder in Pennsylvania
Violence against women in the United States
Murder–suicides in Pennsylvania
Deaths by firearm in Pennsylvania
2009 in Pennsylvania
Crimes in Pennsylvania
Attacks in the United States in 2009
August 2009 crimes
Mass shootings in Pennsylvania
Incel-related violence
History of women in Pennsylvania