Sylvia Seegrist went psycho and killed three innocent people at the Springfield, Pa., mall

Long before the bullets started flying, everyone knew something was very wrong with Sylvia Seegrist. Acquaintances said she was always angry and nicknamed her “Ms. Rambo.” Even her mother was terrified. In July 1985, Ruth Seegrist wrote an article for a Pennsylvania paper, the Springfield Press, about life with her paranoid schizophrenic 25-year-old daughter. She had pleaded for years to keep her child locked up, but to no avail. “What do you need? Blood on the floor?” she wrote. Four months later, this mother’s worst nightmare came true. Around 4 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 30, 1985, Sylvia Seegrist, dressed in Army fatigues and black boots, parked her car at the front of the Springfield Mall, stepped out and started shooting.

Bullets from her .22 semi-automatic rifle missed her first targets — a woman at an ATM and a man walking in the lot. A group of children standing outside the Magic Pan restaurant were not so lucky. A bullet tore into the tiny chest of Recife Cosmen, 2, hitting him in the heart. His two cousins, Tiffany Wootson, 10, and Kareen Wootson, 9, were also shot, but they would recover from their wounds. From there, Seegrist dashed into the mall. People first thought that the pop, pop, pop of the rifle was part of a marketing or Halloween stunt, since the holiday was just a day away.

But then they saw blood on the floor and heard screams. Shoppers scrambled for cover in jewelry vaults, dressing rooms, back offices, any place that would put them out of the gunwoman’s sight. Seegrist continued, swinging the rifle, shooting wildly, randomly, into groups in front of the restaurants and stores. It took all of five minutes for her to get off 15 shots, wounding 10, three fatally. In addition to Cosmen, Augusto Ferrara, 64, died on the spot, Another shopper, Dr. Ernest Trout, 67, suffered wounds to his head, abdomen and buttocks. He died a few days later at the hospital.

The shooting might have gone on, had it not been for a graduate student, Jack Laufer, out on a date with a new girlfriend, Victoria Loring, both 24 and EMTs for the local fire department. Laufer saw a woman in fatigues, shooting a rifle, and jumped to the conclusion it was all a Halloween prank. He didn’t think it was funny. Seegrist took aim at him, but Laufer simply walked up to her and wrestled the gun from her grip. He turned her over to police, and then the unassuming hero rushed, with his girlfriend, to help the wounded.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/justice-story/ms-rambo-kill-spree-article-1.1211691