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| 4 killed in shooting spree |
Authorities have identified the suspect as Kurt Meyers, 64, of Mohawk. He is considered armed and dangerous and still on the loose in Herkimer, police say.
Officials say guns and ammunition were found inside his apartment after emergency crews were sent to a fire there Wednesday morning.
The Utica Observer-Dispatch reports that police are focusing on Freddy's Jewelers on Main Street in Herkimer, where two people were fatally shot at a car wash and oil change business.
The newspaper reports that officials in the neighboring village of Mohawk, where two other people were killed in a barbershop, seem to think Meyers is still on foot somewhere.
Other reports suggest he may have been picked up by a taxi.
The two villages are about 65 miles east of Syracuse, on opposite sides of the Mohawk River in a region known as the Mohawk Valley.
The Observer-Dispatch reported that firefighters responded to a fire at an apartment building that is believed to be connected to the shooting. Police were seen removing about six long guns from the building.
Herkimer County Community College and local schools were on lockdown. The college sent an automated cellphone alert around 10:40 a.m., telling students and staff that there was an "active shooter" in the area.
The message identified the gunman as a man in his 60s, with a white beard and driving a red Jeep Cherokee. A text alert a few minutes later said the campus was on lockdown. Another alert advised people to remain inside buildings until further notice.
Amanda Viscomi, Herkimer's acting clerk-treasurer for the village of 7,700, told The Associated Press the shooting at Gaffey's happened a few blocks from village hall. She said she was told the shooter was at large and that state police, sheriff's deputies and other police were swarming the area.
"Everybody's on lockdown, all the schools, the college, the village," Viscomi said. "It's very, very scary."
Herkimer is named for the German immigrant family that settled in the western Mohawk Valley in the 1720s. The economically distressed villages are two miles away from Ilion, where a 2-century-old Remington Arms gun plant is a major employer.