Gunman Kills Five in Midtown Manhattan Office Building, New york city Before Taking Own Life

Chaos ripped through Midtown Manhattan Monday evening as a heavily armed gunman stormed a prestigious Park Avenue skyscraper, claiming the lives of four people including a revered NYPD officer before turning the rifle on himself. The 44-story tower, home to the NFL’s national headquarters as well as global financial giants like Blackstone and KPMG, became the epicenter of terror just after 6:30 p.m. when 27-year-old Shane Devon Tamura entered the lobby, armed with an assault rifle and dressed in body armor.

Tamura, a Las Vegas native with a documented history of mental health struggles, drove across the country to New York, arriving mere hours before unleashing carnage. Authorities recovered prescription medication, a handgun, ammunition, and several loaded magazines from his BMW, still idling outside the building as SWAT units converged.

Surveillance cameras captured Tamura brazenly striding into 345 Park Avenue, rifle at his side. He opened fire on an off-duty police officer detailed to the building, then targeted civilians who scrambled for cover in the marbled atrium. Panic spread as Tamura dispatched a barrage of gunfire, killing three people in the lobby before entering the elevators. Riding to the 33rd floor, where he mistakenly ended up at the offices of Rudin Management instead of the NFL as he had allegedly intended, he killed another employee before taking his own life.

Amid the wails of sirens and mass evacuation, survivors described frenetic scenes: professionals in shirtsleeves sprinting barefoot down Park Avenue, office furniture hastily pushed against doors, emails alerting staff to barricade in place. Police helicopters, drones, and K-9 units quickly sealed the area, searching each floor and combing nearby vehicles.

New York Mayor Eric Adams hailed the slain police officer, 36-year-old Didarul Islam, a father of two with a third child on the way, as a hero who sacrificed himself to shield innocent New Yorkers. Among the other victims were a senior executive from Blackstone, a security guard, and another building employee. A fifth person remains hospitalized, critically wounded but stabilized following emergency surgery.

Investigators revealed that Tamura left behind a cryptic handwritten note invoking chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), the brain condition linked to repeated head trauma suffered by athletes. “Study my brain please. I’m sorry,” he wrote, also referencing football’s dangers and accusing the NFL of hiding those risks to protect its bottom line. Despite his purported obsession with CTE, Tamura was only ever a high school football player, never in the professional leagues, and authorities have so far found no evidence of a traumatic brain injury or any direct link to the NFL or its staff.

The final moments unfolded in a matter of minutes, but the aftermath rippled far beyond the sleek corridors of Park Avenue. Thousands were left stranded as police swept the neighborhood, shut down subway stations, and secured a perimeter that stretched across several city blocks. Witnesses recounted the confusion; some suspected a terrorist attack in the initial chaos, others clung to loved ones as they watched armored officers fill the streets.

By Tuesday morning, New York reeled from the shock, the second mass shooting at a commercial site in under a year, while officials and security experts pondered motives and the ongoing challenges of securing high-profile targets. For the NYPD and the families of the victims, grief met resilience as the investigation pressed onward, promising answers but offering little comfort to a shaken city.