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Summary Statement
A stabbing near a Pentagon bus station sends the Pentagon into lockdown and leaves the suspect and a Pentagon Force Protection Agency officer dead.
Attack Overview
On Tuesday, August 3rd 2021, at approximately 10:40 am local time, 27 year old Austin William Lanz exited a bus at the mass transit facility, which services the Pentagon, and attacked Pentagon Force Protection Agency Officer George Gonzalez with a knife, severely wounding him. A struggle ensued, in which the subject mortally wounded Officer Gonzalez and then shot himself with the officer’s service weapon. Other PFPA officers engaged the subject, who ultimately died at the scene.
A civilian bystander, who was also injured during the incident, was transported to a hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, and later released. The Arlington County Fire and EMS Department said they encountered multiple patients at the scene, but did not provide further information on their condition, other than to say all the victims had been taken to the hospital.
Despite initial reports indicating multiple assailants, Woodrow Kusse, the chief of the Pentagon Force Protection Agency, said that there is no active search for additional suspects.
The FBI Washington Field Office is lead agency investigating the incident. A motive is unknown at this time.
Suspect
Police have identified the suspect as 27-year-old Austin William Lanz. While the motive remains unclear, Lanz had a troubled past that included a recent arrest. In October 2012, he enlisted in the Marine Corps but was “administratively separated” less than a month later, the Corps said.
In April of this year, Lanz was arrested in Cobb County, Georgia, after breaking into a neighbor’s home with a crowbar. According to police, he was recorded by home surveillance footage wandering around the house for 13 minutes, turning on the lights and “searching through the residence for something or someone.”
While being processed at the county jail, Lanz allegedly attacked two sheriff’s deputies in the intake area without provocation, injuring one who sustained a chipped bone and torn ligament in her knee.
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