Gunman kills 4, wounds 6 at Pennsylvania town meeting

A gunman killed four people at a town meeting near Allentown, Pa., before he was tackled by an official who shot him with his own weapon, authorities said. At least six people were wounded in the Monday night shooting, with at least one victim hospitalized in critical condition, authorities said early Tuesday. State police said Rockne Warren Newell, 59, of Ross Township, 30 miles north of Allentown, first fired a long gun through the Ross Township municipal building windows during a town supervisors meeting around 7:20 p.m. Fifteen to 18 members of the township's Supervisors Council and the public were at the meeting. Newell then entered the building, still firing, before briefly leaving and returning with a handgun, police said. The executive director of a park and open space commission "bear-hugged [Newell] and took him down. He shot [Newell] with his own gun," a witness told WCAU-TV, Philadelphia. Another person helped tackle and restrain Newell until police arrived, witnesses said. wewell was taken to a hospital and later released to police, who didn't immediately give a motive for the shooting. The Pocono Record in Stroudsburg reported in June Newell was in a dispute with the township for 18 years over the condition of his property. A Monroe County judge ordered him to vacate the property a year ago and he started living in his 1984 Pontiac Fiero and in abandoned buildings. "They have no right to kick me off my property," Newell told the newspaper in June. "They call my property an 'eyesore.' When I bought it, it was one of only three properties on the entire road that didn't have what they call 'junk.'"