Dispatchers received a call Tuesday saying a man entered the Children’s Medical Group’s offices with a gun and held hostages inside the building.
Initially, several hostages were held, police said, but several escaped and were let go, except for Dr. Katherine Dodson, a CMG pediatrician. The hostages told officers the man was armed with a gun and looked like a shotgun, police said. He also had two bags.
The gunman was identified as Dr. Bharat Narumanchi, 43, a pediatrician who was recently diagnosed with terminal cancer, police said. He had visited the CMG office a week before the shooting and applied for a volunteer position. Aside from his recent visit, police were unable to find any connection between Dodson and Narumanchi.
Hostage negotiators arrived at the scene and tried to make contact with Narumanchi, but were unsuccessful. After repeated attempts, SWAT agents entered the building where they found Dodson and Narumanchi dead from apparent gunshot wounds.
“It appears that Dr. Narumanchi was shot after Dr. Dodson was shot,” according to the police department’s press release. The incident is still under investigation.
The Travis County Medical Examiner will perform an autopsy to determine the cause and official form of death.
Dodson, 43, joined CMG as a pediatrician in 2017, according to the medical center’s website. She was a native of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and was married with three children, according to the website.