Gunman opens fire on Florida school board

A gunman opened fire at a Florida school board meeting late yesterday before taking his own life, with the entire dramatic standoff captured on film.

Officials said no one beside the gunman was injured in the harrowing episode, which was recounted in detail to US television Wednesday by the head of the school panel.

"It was the most surreal thing I have ever been a part of," said Bill Husfelt, chairman of the school board in Panama City, Florida, speaking on NBC television's "Today" show.

Husfelt described how the gunman calmly walked to the front of a meeting room that minutes earlier had been filled with students, spray-painted a red "V" with a circle around it on a wall, and then brandished his firearm.

The man, who railed about high taxes and class warfare, complained that his wife had recently lost her job working for the school district.

Husfelt said he tried to negotiate with the gunman by offering to help his wife get a new position.

"He almost had like a grimace, a smile," he said. "We knew it wasn't going to end well," Husfelt said.

"He had already told us he was going to die. He told us he was going to kill himself basically, and he was going to try to do the same to us."

Minutes into the standoff, the footage showed the man opening fire on school board members seated just a few feet away, pulling the trigger several times but miraculously, hitting no one.

Officials said videotaping of school board meetings is done routinely for public record.

Eventually, a security guard opened fire on the man, wounding him, and the gunman turned his weapon on himself.

The video showed a particularly dramatic moment early on, when one brave board member, attempting an act of heroism, snuck up behind the gunman and hit him on the head with her purse.

The man wheeled around and knocked her to ground, then pointed his weapon at her, but did not pull the trigger.

Board member Ginger Littleton later explained to NBC that she had hoped "to defend, delay, somehow or other divert -- hoping that the cavalry would come soon."

"I was pretty stupid," she said.