Three dead, two wounded in Denny's shooting

Police say three dead, two wounded in restaurant shooting




2:20 p.m. March 15, 2006

PISMO BEACH – A gunman opened fire inside a crowded Denny's restaurant during lunch hour Wednesday, killing two people and wounding two before taking his own life, police said.

“There could have been 30 or 40 people inside. As the shootings occurred, people were fleeing the restaurant, hiding in bathrooms,” Cmdr. Jeff Norton said.

Police said they did not know the motive for the shootings.

Police Chief Joe Cortez said authorities have not found any connection between the gunman and the victims and it doesn't appear he had a grudge against Denny's or its employees.

He said the man began shooting within a few steps of the restaurant's front door.

“The witnesses described him as coming in with a dazed look on his face, then they said he started shooting,” Cortez said.

The names of the gunman and the victims were not immediately released. Nor was the condition of the wounded.

Cindy Tabelin of Stockton said her 68-year-old cousin was one of the victims. She told the San Luis Obispo Telegram-Tribune that said she and her mother were on their way into the restaurant when the shooting started.

Her cousin was inside with his wife and young granddaughter, Tabelin said.

She sat on a curb in the restaurant parking lot after the shooting. “I'm waiting for them to let us have our cousin,” she said.

Her cousin's granddaughter was not shot, but “she just watched her grandfather get killed,” Tabelin said.

Pismo Beach is in San Luis Obispo County, about a 190-mile drive northwest of Los Angeles.