Laura Patterson, 47, was arrested by Port of Portland police after allegedly shooting a gun into the air near the security checkpoint for concourses D and E. She likely faces a dozen criminal charges, including four alleging attempted murder.
Court records released Thursday indicate Patterson drove from her home in Kennewick, Washington, to PDX to shoot her gun but not to hurt anybody.
“Patterson stated that when she arrived at the checkpoint she unzipped her purse, took out the gun and shot it,” she told a detective, according to court records provided by the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office. “Patterson advised she came to the airport because she needed to do something because she wanted to kill her family members.” …
Police also talked to a witness who said he heard two bangs and then saw a woman put a gun down on the floor and say something along the lines of, “Is anyone going to do anything?”
A man who was in the bathroom near the checkpoint at the time has said the woman told him the gun went off after she dropped it.
“‘Cause I’m crazy, I guess,” the woman told Patrick Leonard, 58, when he asked her why she’d dropped the gun.
— Fedor Zarkhin in PDX airport shooting suspect said she fired gun on purpose but didn’t want to hurt anyone, prosecutors say
