Northern California shooter’s victims include neighbors with whom he’d been feuding, sheriff’s official says

By DON THOMPSON and PAUL ELIAS

The Associated Press

RANCHO TEHAMA RESERVE — A Northern California man killed two neighbors with whom he had been feuding before he went on a shooting rampage Tuesday at apparent random sites — including an elementary school that successfully locked him out — in a series of attacks where he killed two more people and injured 10 before police fatally shot him, officials said.

Police said surveillance video shows the shooter unsuccessfully trying to enter a nearby elementary school after quick-thinking staff members locked the outside doors and barricaded themselves inside when they heard gunshots.

The shooter Tuesday morning in Rancho Tehama was being prosecuted for assault stemming from an attack on neighbors in January and possession of an assault weapon.

Tehama County Assistant Sheriff Phil Johnston said the gunman spent about six minutes shooting into Rancho Tehama Elementary School before driving off to continue shooting elsewhere. Johnston said one student was shot and injured and is expected to survive.

“It was a bizarre and murderous rampage,” Johnston said.

He said the 45-minute spree ended when a patrol car rammed the stolen vehicle the shooter was driving and killed him in a shootout. Johnston said the shooter was facing charges of assaulting one of the feuding neighbors in January and that she had a restraining order against him.

“I think the motive of getting even with his neighbors and when it went that far — he just went on a rampage,” Johnston said. He said there was a “domestic violence” report Monday involving the gunman, but didn’t provide any further details.

At least one of the victims has life-threatening injuries, he said.

Johnston declined to identify the shooter until his relatives were notified, but he confirmed the gunman was charged with assault in January and had a restraining order placed against him. The district attorney, Gregg Cohen, told the Sacramento Bee he is prosecuting a man named Kevin Neal in that case.

Kevin Janson Neal was arrested Jan. 31 and booked into Tehama County Jail on charges of assault with a deadly weapon, according to the Red Bluff Daily News.

Neal was due to stand trial on charges of second-degree burglary, assault with a deadly weapon, two counts of false imprisonment by violence, discharge of a firearm with gross negligence, possession of an assault weapon and misdemeanor battery, records show.

Court documents list Neal as owning an AR-15 Bushmaster rifle, but it is not known whether it was used in Tuesday’s shootings.

Tehama County District Attorney Gregg Cohen said Neal had a long-running dispute with his neighbors and during the January incident allegedly shot through a wooden fence at two female neighbors as they walked along the fence. Neal then jumped the fence, confronted the women, stabbed one and took a cellphone from the other, Cohen said.

Neal’s mother, in Raleigh, N.C., told The Associated Press he called her Monday and told her “it’s all over now.”

The woman, who would only be identified as Anne, said her son was frustrated by constant feuding with his neighbors and told her “I’m on a cliff and there’s nowhere to go.”

She said he told her he believed the neighbors were cooking methamphetamine.

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