The Bay Area’s deadliest shootings over the years

Four people were found shot and killed on Monday Jan. 23, 2023 in Half Moon Bay, one in a string of deadly mass shootings in the Bay Area over the years. The shooting was reported around 2:20 p.m. at Mountain Mushroom on San Mateo Road near Highway 92.

There are no agreed-upon definitions of what constitutes a mass shooting, according to a Rand Corp. analysis last month, though Congress in 2013 defined mass killing as a single incident that leaves three or more people dead. The Associated Press and other organizations have defined it as four people fatally injured, excluding the shooter.

Here’s a list of other Bay Area mass shootings.

May 26, 2021: Vally Transportation Authority, San Jose

9 dead

A disgruntled mechanic killed nine people and himself near a light rail yard and the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office in San Jose, marking the Bay Area’s deadliest mass shooting.

October 31, 2019: Private rental home, Orinda

5 dead, 3 wounded

Five people were killed and four more injured during a shooting at an Orinda Halloween party in an Airbnb rental mansion. Authorities said there were multiple shooters and although five suspects were identified, none were charged.

July 28, 2019: Gilroy Garlic Festival

4 dead, including the shooter,17 wounded

A gunman identified as 19-year-old Santino William Legan killed three people and wounded 17 others in a mass shooting at the Gilroy Garlic Festival before committing suicide in a shootout with responding police officers.

June 23, 2019: Private home, San Jose

5 dead, including the shooter

A standoff with police ended with five people killed, including the suspect, identified as 66-year-old Chi Dinh Ta, in what police said was a quadruple murder and suicide driven by family conflict.

June 14, 2017: UPS facility, San Francisco4 dead, including the shooter, 2 wounded.

Jimmy Lam, a UPS worker, shot and killed three co-workers at a company facility in San Francisco. Two people were wounded. Lam killed himself after police told him to put down the gun.

Lam, 38, a UPS driver, filed a grievance in earlier 2017 claiming he was working excessive overtime, a union official said at the time.

March 21, 2012: Oikos University, Oakland7 dead, 3 wounded

One L. Goh, of Alameda, killed seven people and wounded three others in a shooting rampage at Oikos University, a small Oakland nursing college. He will spend the rest of his life in prison under a plea deal.

Goh is a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic whose delusions led him to believe that the administration and staff at Oikos University were conspiring against him, alienating him from classmates, and covertly having him bugged and followed. Goh told police he went to the Oikos campus in East Oakland that day to confront a specific administrator.

Oct. 5, 2011: Lehigh Hanson’s Permanente Cement Plant, Cupertino4 dead, including the shooter, 7 wounded

Shareef Allman gunned down three coworkers at a Cupertino cement plant and wounded seven other people before he was shot to death by police in a gunfight.

The 47-year-old heavy equipment operator at Lehigh Hanson’s Permanente Cement Plant had been in a safety meeting with more than a dozen coworkers when he pulled a gun from his waistband and began shooting. One of the survivors of the shooting said Allman felt co-workers were trying have him fired after he was repeatedly accused of driving recklessly at the quarry.

Allman kept a handgun at home hidden in the cutout pages of a Bible.

March 30, 2009: Private home, Santa Clara6 dead, including the shooter, and 1 wounded

Devan Kalathat shot and killed his 11-year-old son and 4-year-old daughter, his brother-in-law and his wife, and their 11-month-old daughter. He killed himself. Kalathat’s wife was critically wounded, but survived.

Kalathat’s wife later said she had no idea what triggered the massacre, but an autopsy found her husband had a benign brain tumor that might have caused headaches.

March 21, 2009: Oakland police shooting5 dead, including the shooter

Lovelle Mixon shot to death four Oakland police officers, two during what appeared to be a routine traffic stop by motorcycle officers. The other two officers were members of a SWAT team who were killed inside an apartment where the gunman was hiding. Officers shot and killed the 27-year-old parolee.

It was the deadliest incident in the department’s history.

Nov. 14, 2008: SiPort, Santa Clara3 dead, 2 wounded

Jing Hua Wu, 47, of Mountain View, shot and killed three coworkers at a Santa Clara semiconductor company after he had been laid off.

Wu, who was convicted of the shooting, killed the CEO and another top executive at SiPort. He told jurors during the trial that he shot his gun accidentally.

Nov. 23, 2006: Private home, Oakland3 dead, two wounded

Asmeron Gebreselassie shot his sister in law and two of her relatives during a Thanksgiving dinner at the family’s home in Oakland, to avenge what he believed was his sister in law’s role in his own brother’s death.

Gebreselassie and his brother Tewodros Gebreselassie — who let his brother into the home — were convicted of the murders in 2011, but Tewodros Gebreselassie’s conviction was overturned in 2015 and he pleaded guilty to lesser charges of voluntary manslaughter. he was released from prison in 2016. Asmeron Gebreselassie was sentenced to life in prison.

Dec. 6, 2003: Private home, Santa Clara5 dead, including the shooter.

Todd Vernon shot and killed his wife and his three children, before turning a .357 Magnum on himself.

His wife had confided to a friend that she wanted out of her six-year marriage with Vernon, who was unemployed. In the suicide note Vernon sent by FedEx to his mother’s Orange County home, he said he couldn’t live without his wife and he couldn’t stand the thought of someone else raising his three children from a previous marriage. By killing the kids, experts say, he was taking the children away from his first wife, with whom he had bitterly fought for custody.

June 21, 2000: Santos Linguisa Factory, San Leandro3 dead

Stuart Alexander, nicknamed the “Sausage King,” gunned down three government meat inspectors, missing a fourth who ran for his life, inside the the Santos Linguisa Factory in San Leandro.

Alexander got into a dispute with the U.S. Department of Agriculture after the agency contended he was not heating his sausages properly. When the inspectors arrived at his property to shut him down, he shot them.

Alexander was convicted of the murders, which were caught on surveillance video, and died on Death Row of natural causes at age 44.

July 1, 1993: 101 California Street, San Francisco9 dead, including the shooter, 6 wounded

Gian Luigi Ferri shot and killed eight people and wounded six others at the San Francisco law firm Pettit & Martin in the city’s worst mass shooting. Ferri killed himself after the shooting at the high-rise building.

The 55-year-old failed entrepreneur’s motive is still unknown. The shooting led Congress to pass historic gun reform legislation.

Feb. 16, 1988: ESL Incorporated, Sunnyvale7 dead, 4 wounded

Richard Wade Farley shot and killed seven coworkers and injured four others at ESL Incorporated, a Sunnyvale defense contractor.

Farley draped himself in 98 pounds of guns and ammunition when he went on the shooting spree inspired by his obsession with a female colleague who did not accept his advances over three years. That woman was severely wounded in the attack, but survived and testified against Farley, who was sentenced to die.

Dec. 8, 1986: Private home, Oakland6 dead

David Welch burst into an East Oakland home and shot six people, including two toddlers, in their heads as they slept. The 28-year-old heroin and cocaine dealer, who remains on Death Row, went from room to room shooting his victims on Pearmain Street.

Welch had been upset over the breakup with his 16-year-old girlfriend, so he killed her and five of her relatives and friends.