Man shot by police after he stabbed four at postal facility

KEARNY, N.J. (AP) -- A former postal worker may have been seeking retaliation against his co-workers when he stabbed four of them at a mail facility before police shot and killed him, authorities said.

The 26-year-old Newark man, whose name was not immediately released, had been a temporary worker at the bulk transfer facility. He quit March 5 following a personnel dispute, Hudson County authorities said.

The man, an Ethiopian who immigrated to the United States in 1994, was armed with a .380-caliber handgun and two knives. He entered the lobby at about 6:30 p.m. Tuesday during a shift change, according to Terrence Hull, the county's first assistant prosecutor.

A worker saw the man enter the facility with a gun and told him, "Don't do this. Just go away," then ran to call 911, Esposito said.

The man attacked the four, who suffered minor stab wounds and cuts.

"The whole thing lasted 15 minutes. There was a lot of yelling, people panicking, breaking down crying," said Licious Leverson, a postal employee who was inside the building, where about 250 people work.

Three Kearny police officers found the man in a locker room.

"He approached the officers, and he was instructed to drop his weapons," Hull said. "When he didn't, all three officers discharged their weapons."

At least a dozen shots were fired. The man was pronounced dead at the scene; the injured workers were treated at hospitals and released.

Anthony Esposito, a spokesman for the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, said the man had a dispute with a female co-worker before he left the job. That woman was not in the building during the attack, Esposito said.