Photo: Morgan Hill Police Department
“Pretty normal white guy” deemed very not normal after shooting up the place that fired him.
By Leah Scher — Written on Jun 27, 2019
On June 25th, 60-year-old “pretty normal guy” Steven Leet was waiting in his car after being terminated from his job at a Ford dealership in the San Francisco Bay area. A short while later, he returned to the store with a gun and opened fire in a meeting, killing two other employees in the process. His victims were 59-year-old Brian Light and 38-year-old Xavier Souto. Light, Souto, and Leet were all from San Jose. Now they’re all dead.
What’s there to know?
1. Brian Light tried and failed to stop him.
Steven Leet, who worked at the parts counter serving technicians who serviced vehicles in the shop, was fired around 4:15 p.m. We’re not quite sure where exactly he went between then and 6:03 p.m. when the attack happened, but Chief David Swing of Morgan Hill, California reported that Leet waited in his car for about 20 minutes before walking back into the building to return to his work station. He was escorted into a back office to have a conversation with Xavier Souto and Brian Light, the former of whom he shot point blank and the latter of whom tried to disarm Leet to no avail.
2. It was a spontaneous murder.
When police searched Leet’s home, they found no evidence of motive or pre-meditation. “It appears to be a spontaneous action on behalf of the suspect,” Swing said in a press conference. Leet also had no prior criminal history.
3. He committed suicide after killing the two other employees.
By the time officers and medics arrived (supposedly only minutes after the incident was reported), the three men were deceased. Leet lay on the ground beside a handgun with a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
4. One of the witnesses, Doug Macglashan, was just there for the day.
Macglashan was hired by the Ford dealership for the day to train employees on new software. He was nearly done when the shooting happened. He said Leet wouldn’t leave the premises after he was fired. “About 10, 15 minutes later, gunshots,” he said. “It’s just scarier than hell. I’m not used to hearing gunshots, I’m not used to being around this type of violence. So it’s just scary.”
Leah Scher is an ENFP finishing her degree at Brandeis University. She's an alumna of the Kenyon Review Young Writer's Workshop the Iowa Young Writers' Studio. She's passionate about Judaism, poetry, film, satire, astrology, spirituality, and sexual health. She draws inspiration for her writing from writer/director Wes Anderson, and for her lifestyle from her grandmother. Lastly, she's always actively seeking two things: a job having anything at all to do with publishing, and a chance to meet Jesse Eisenberg.