As is all too common with active shooter/killer events, the perpetrator in the attack at the WTS Paradigm facility in Middleton, Wisconsin had a previous history of irrational behavior to the extent that he’d even seen his guns confiscated years previously. Fourteen years prior to the attack he committed at his place of employment, Anthony Tong had been committed to a mental health hospital and was barred from purchasing firearms after having made threatening comments about his co-workers. Tong had expressed his belief that his coworkers were gossiping and passing insults about him and made further statements that justified him being committed at that time.
That was in South Dakota and thirteen years later, Tong moved to Wisconsin. In 2004 in South Dakota, Tong was committed for mental health evaluation after officers responding to his apartment (reason for response not specified) and found him acting in a paranoid fashion. He first refused them entry to his apartment but then when he did finally let them in, they found that he had dismantled and disconnected many of the electronic devices in his apartment such as lights, ceiling fans, smoke detectors and fire alarms. Tong, at that time, was in possession of a handgun and had an AR-15 rifle in the apartment. He told the detectives on scene that he had disconnected and dismantled the electronic devices because all of them housed listening devices his neighbors and coworkers were using too eavesdrop on him. Tong was committed for a 24-hour emergency evaluation and a state judge revoked his concealed carry permit in South Dakota a short while later.
Timing and circumstance make it appear as if Tong moved to Middleton, Wisconsin to take the job at WTS Paradigm, a software company. Records indicate that Tong started with the company in April 2017 - so roughly 14 months prior to committing his attack.
On Wednesday, September 19th, 2018, Tong took a handgun into his place of employment and shot four fellow employees. Two men and one woman were seriously injured by Tong’s gunfire and a fourth employee, not further identified, was grazed by a bullet. The injury to that fourth employee wasn’t serious enough to require transportation to the hospital.
Upon receiving the 911 call, officers were dispatched and the first two officers on the scene engaged Tong. True to contemporary policies and protocols, they fired on Tong and he was killed on the scene. One of the two officers who responded was an active shooter response instructor, firearms instructor and less lethal instructor.
Post investigation of the event did not reveal a motive. One of the victims was shot ten times. Given that all three victims were listed as “hospitalized in fair condition” within just a day or so indicates that Tong wasn’t that great of a shot. Hitting a single victim ten times is certainly a great marksmanship rate, but to not hit that victim with a single fatal shot doesn’t speak to such marksmanship.
Part of the post incident investigation, as is typical, was the execution of a search warrant on his place of residence. During the execution of that search, law enforcement seized guns, muzzleloaders, scopes, a suppressor, ballistic vests and a helmet and several boxes of ammunition. The Middleton Police Chief at the time made it clear that Tong should not have been able to legally purchase a firearm.
This event clearly demonstrates an on-going challenge that law enforcement and society at large faces in the prevention of active shooter events: the perpetrator had a history of mental health issues in a different state and wasn’t legally able to purchase firearms. The continuing challenge is that mental health records are all too often not available to law enforcement for the purposes of either taking action prior to an attack or for prohibiting firearms purchases on a nationwide basis.
Until such time as laws are modified or exemptions legislatively created that allow background investigations to access mental health records, we will continue to see attacks committed by people who have a documented history of such challenges and who shouldn’t be allowed access to firearms, but who continue to buy guns to enact their violence.
In the meantime, all any of us can do is pay attention to the behavior of our coworkers and properly call attention about any concerns we have to our management and law enforcement personnel.
Joshua Borelli
Joshua Borelli has been studying active shooter and mass attack events over the course of the past several years, commensurate with receiving training on response and recovery to natural disasters and civil disturbances. Joshua started to outline this series of articles in an attempt to identify commonalities and logistical needs patterns for response.
