Saturday, June 15, 2013
The St. Louis businessman who killed three employees before turning
the gun on himself was a Somali immigrant, described by friends as an
intelligent man who was quick to reach out to other new-arriving
Somalis, but who had lingering anger years after the divorce from his
first wife.
Police say 59-year-old Ahmed Dirir walked into his
business, AK Home Health Care LLC, on Thursday afternoon, got into a
brief argument, and then shot his three employees. Killed were
44-year-old Khadra Muse of Olivette, Mo., 29-year-old Seaeed Abdulla of
St. Louis, and 54-year-old Bernice Solomon-Redd of East St. Louis, Ill.
Dirir, Muse and Abdulla were all from Somalia, said Omar
Jamal of the Somali mission to the U.N. Jamal, who often gets involved
in issues of high interest involving Somalis in the U.S., said he spoke
with several friends and relatives of Dirir and the victims, including
the wives of Dirir and Abdulla.
The home health agency was headquartered in a small
business incubator building in a former movie theater on Cherokee
Street, a revitalizing mixed-race neighborhood about five miles south of
downtown St. Louis.