Apple CEO Tim Cook has offered condolences after crazed YouTube shooter Nasim Najafi Aghdam opened fire in a courtyard at YouTube’s headquarters Tuesday afternoon. YouTube is a Google subsidiary. Google itself is a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc.
“The night before Nasim Aghdam opened fire in a courtyard at YouTube’s headquarters Tuesday afternoon, Mountain View police found the San Diego woman sleeping in her car,” The Mercury News reports.
“She had been reported missing by her family in Southern California, and her father Ismail Aghdam told police she might be going to YouTube because she ‘hated’ the company. Police called the family at 2 a.m. Tuesday to say she’d been found and that everything was ‘under control,’ her father said,” The Mercury News reports. “But hours later, his daughter was dead of a self-inflicted gunshot after shooting three people and causing an afternoon of terror at YouTube’s headquarters.”
From everyone at Apple, we send our sympathy and support to the team at YouTube and Google, especially the victims and their families. — Tim Cook
From everyone at Apple, we send our sympathy and support to the team at YouTube and Google, especially the victims and their families.
— Tim Cook (@tim_cook) April 3, 2018
U.S. President Trump also tweeted his support:
Was just briefed on the shooting at YouTube’s HQ in San Bruno, California. Our thoughts and prayers are with everybody involved. Thank you to our phenomenal Law Enforcement Officers and First Responders that are currently on the scene. – President Trump
Was just briefed on the shooting at YouTube’s HQ in San Bruno, California. Our thoughts and prayers are with everybody involved. Thank you to our phenomenal Law Enforcement Officers and First Responders that are currently on the scene.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 3, 2018
“It appears Aghdam controlled multiple YouTube channels, including one with videos of her speaking Farsi,” NBC Bay Area reports. “Aghdam posted videos about an array of topics including hand art and animal rights.”
“The NBC Bay Area Investigative Unit has also learned the license plate on a car towed from YouTube’s campus Tuesday is registered to Aghdam,” NBC Bay Area reports. “In 2014, she posted a video on YouTube of what appears to be the same car, stating that it was vandalized by ‘anti-vegans’ because a bumper sticker said, “’meat is murder.'”
“Aghdam, who referred to herself as a ‘vegan bodybuilder’, also frequently posted about animal rights and even held a funeral for her rabbit,” The Daily Mail reports. “She also posted videos of animal abuse, including a dog being boiled alive, as well as pictures of herself in evening gowns posing in front of fake painted backgrounds.”
“The woman who opened fire at YouTube’s offices in California on Tuesday raged against the video-sharing service for what she saw as censorship of her clips on her niche channel covering vegan issues, animal rights, Persian culture and fitness,” The Telegraph reports.
The suspected shooter in today’s YouTube incident has been identified. Please see press release for details – https://t.co/Xvr2l9bB9s pic.twitter.com/NEBoX3WWK5
— San Bruno Police (@SanBrunoPolice) April 4, 2018
“Ms Aghdam’s family say she was ‘angry’ with the company and had complained about YouTube supposedly censoring her videos and cutting her ad revenue,” The Telegrah reports. “They had reported her missing to police and warned them she ‘might do something’ after officers spotted her sleeping in a car in Mountain View hours before the shooting.”
MacDailyNews Take: Our condolences as well to those injured and their families.