Nov. 6, 2026
Orlando Man “Irate” Over $2500 Debt Opens Fire, Murders Woman Crawling Away; Taken Out By Armed Security
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RSS Feed 35-year-old Jacob Pearson first threatened a Citibank employee over the phone regarding a $2500 credit card debt, and then drove more than an hour to the bank’s Tampa headquarters and opened fire. Pearson rammed through the complex gate and was armed with 90 rounds of ammunition. Thankfully, his rifle malfunctioned after shooting one victim, but he returned with another gun to kill 41-year-old HR employee Leanne Selman, who was trying to crawl away to safety. An armed security guard was able to shoot Pearson five times before police arrived, saving countless lives. It’s a tragic and bizarre story; Pearson had a wife, a young child and no prior criminal history.
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00:00:02
Speaker 1: Hey there, folks. It is Friday, November 6th. $ 2, 500. That is what prompted a man to go irate, according to authorities, drive his car into a bank complex and start shooting. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ Robes. An attack we talked about in Tampa. that seemed potentially like it could have been a mass shooting situation. And then there ended up being one woman dead. So they said it was a target attack. We thought he was just targeting possibly One person. That ain't the case. Yes.
00:00:38
Speaker 2: It seemed like perhaps there was some sort of a relationship or a vendetta.
00:00:42
Speaker 1: First thing we thought, yeah.
00:00:43
Speaker 2: Right? That you would have a man go to such lengths to drive his car through the gate of this Citibank complex. And if you haven't seen the video, it's pretty remarkable. And then, yes, shoot and... almost kill a young woman, and then go back to the car to get a gun, because his gun jammed, to finish the job. Yeah, it seems like he wanted to go after one person, but we are learning oh so much more about his motive, and it was well beyond that.
00:01:16
Speaker 1: We got this word yesterday, and the video was out there, and it is terrifying stuff to see a man walking around in a complex where 3,000 people work in Tampa. This is the Citibank, they call it their complex, but it is a main a city bank center in Tampa. And so we got word about this. It happened on Wednesday, lunchtime. Folks were sitting outside in a little courtyard. You've seen this before. People in a big complex like this, they have tables set up outside for people to eat. And you see this gray sedan just speed through a median, speed through the fence, and a guy gets out and starts shooting. Now, that was the initial word robes and the details we got. A security guy or guard was there. Thank goodness. Armed security guard confronted this man in the cafeteria, shot him. The suspect was then taken to the hospital, later died. Now, that was the story we got. We had a lot of blinks we wanted to fill in, Robes, including a motive. And once police identified, at least publicly, who this suspect was and then start filling in these holes, what? What was going on that set him off to do this, Robes? I know things are tight But what was happening? $ 2, 500 is what they're saying caused all this.
00:02:32
Speaker 2: Yes, the backstory to this now is so hard to get your head around because, yes, apparently, yes, this man calls Citibank. because he got summons in the mail saying that he owed $ 2, 500 on his credit card, like credit card debt. So he calls Citibank and makes a threat.
00:02:54
Speaker 3: He gets so angry. He wants them to drop this lawsuit.
00:02:57
Speaker 2: He shouldn't have to pay them $ 2, 500. But he makes a specific threat at 9 a.m. on the call saying, unless you want me to go over there with my AR-15, my bulletproof vest, and my insanity, cancel this court case.
00:03:13
Speaker 1: Well, Robes, that's a.
00:03:15
Speaker 1: I don't know. They took it seriously. Sounds serious to me. You would have to think, who would say something like that? Ropes? But they took action.
00:03:27
Speaker 3: Yes.
00:03:27
Speaker 2: So Citibank, the attorney who was on the other side, end of that phone call, contacts security. Security contacts Orlando police. Orlando police decide to go do a welfare check, go to his home. His wife is there and he's gone. And his wife tells police, that her husband seemed angry when he left.
00:03:48
Speaker 1: Now, the next step that's done after this is that those authorities in Orlando get a hold of the law enforcement in Tampa, where the Citibank Center is. And so the sheriff's deputies just start heading that direction before any word of anything. They didn't get there before he did. But, Roves, there's something about this. We don't see this. Roves, that's good police response. Robes, it sounds like everything from the lawyer calling security, security calling the authorities, authorities calling the other authorities. Robes, it's kind of comforting to know that the proper protocols were in place and they followed them. That was nice to hear.
00:04:29
Speaker 2: It is, and obviously so many people, all of the steps taken along the way, clearly saved countless lives, especially when you start to hear the details of, what happened and where Jacob Pearson was about to enter when he was stopped by that security guard. But yes, sheriff deputies head to the Citibank Center in Tampa. Didn't he, didn't Pearson tell the attorney it's only about an hour drive? Didn't he even like describe that it wasn't that far for him to drive? So they had an idea that he might be headed to that facility?
00:05:01
Speaker 1: So again, if that calls at nine, this is about The time of day, it'll take you an hour and a half to do the drive, depending on traffic and exactly where he was leaving from. Yes, we're talking about two hours. Robes, that was a lot of time to calm down.
00:05:12
Speaker 3: That's what I was thinking.
00:05:13
Speaker 1: A lot of time.
00:05:14
Speaker 2: An hour and a half in the car, you're driving to a corporate headquarters of a bank where you actually have credit card debt.
00:05:22
Speaker 3: Like, you owe money. Whether he thought he did or not, okay.
00:05:25
Speaker 2: But that's... I mean, he's obviously in a state of mind or at least a state of function where he was able to drive for an hour and a half.
00:05:33
Speaker 3: It wasn't like he was.
00:05:34
Speaker 2: On drugs or drunk or in some sort of state that was substance-induced.
00:05:40
Speaker 3: He obviously was able.
00:05:41
Speaker 2: To collect his guns, get in the car, drive for an hour and a half, and then to still be that angry, to ram through the gate and then just, what, pick somebody out who was in the wrong place at the wrong time?
00:06:05
Speaker 1: How are you seething? How do you sustain that level of anger for two hours? Really, you're angry enough that you can kill somebody.
00:06:13
Speaker 2: A stranger who's actually done nothing to you individually.
00:06:16
Speaker 1: He stays with you for two hours. Babe, this is what was going on with him and Robles we see sometimes. What causes a mental break? This wasn't a guy who, there's no manifesto he left. They're not going through his online life.
00:06:30
Speaker 2: Right?
00:06:31
Speaker 1: Social media stuff to see if he had something planned. He didn't plan a mass shooting because he was mad at the world. He got a summons.
00:06:39
Speaker 3: Robes.
00:06:40
Speaker 1: That... What was it? That day? No, no, no. Excuse me. He was supposed to be in court on Friday.
00:06:43
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:06:44
Speaker 1: Today. Oh, shit.
00:06:44
Speaker 2: Here we are. Yeah.
00:06:46
Speaker 3: It was supposed to be today, but it's for... a $ 2, 500 debt.
00:06:50
Speaker 2: I'm not trying to minimize for somebody that $ 2, 500 might be like $ 250, 000 to someone else because if you don't have it, you don't have it. But still, I mean, to think that he might have to pay another fine or might have to have a payment plan put in place.
00:07:06
Speaker 1: What? People are, I know this is not an excuse, but people are on edge and people have been pushed to the edge and people have been fighting. And at some point you just Life is too much. It's overwhelming. Times are just hard.
00:07:18
Speaker 3: It's like the final straw.
00:07:20
Speaker 2: You know?
00:07:21
Speaker 3: Where you just snap.
00:07:22
Speaker 1: Now this too?
00:07:24
Speaker 3: Who knows what.
00:07:24
Speaker 2: Else was going on in his life that this just became the moment that he just stopped caring and was so angry he was willing to kill an innocent person and end his own life in the process. But it is remarkable when you talk about the heroes along the way. who absolutely saved other people from being killed because at 12, 11 PM, that is when the security camera catches him driving through that city bank center gate, crashing his vehicle. The deputies were on site in one minute. That is incredible because they were already looking for him.
00:08:02
Speaker 3: And at 12, 15 PM.
00:08:04
Speaker 2: So in four minutes from the time he crashed through that gate, a security guard fires, what, five shots at Pearson? I mean, they have surveillance cameras everywhere, and you can literally watch this happen moment to moment to moment. But he was about to enter the cafeteria where everybody, well, at least countless dozens and dozens of folks were in that cafeteria eating their lunch.
00:08:34
Speaker 1: Well, they and the security guard have to give him All the credit. Yes, there's a deputies were there in one minute and they weren't needed. Both the job had been done by the time they got there. Looks there. There's there's a reason there are armed security guards in some places for these moments and they go through their training. Look, I I my hat's off to everybody here. Every what they say, the head of security at Citibank is a former Secret Service guy.
00:09:01
Speaker 3: That's crazy.
00:09:02
Speaker 2: And when you can watch him, he's actually hiding in a men's bathroom. He's using the men's bathroom entrance, correct, as cover as he then gets out and shoots.
00:09:12
Speaker 3: But then it's pretty remarkable.
00:09:15
Speaker 2: Pearson, even though he gets hit with a couple of bullets, you can see he still picks up his gun and fires back at the security officer. The security officer 100% risked his life and put himself in harm's way.
00:09:26
Speaker 1: They do his job. Look, he did his job. I don't know. I mean, we think about that school shooting that the parent was on the 911 call, said, look, I'm about to go shoot this kid. You're telling me not to go in, but y'all ain't here. Rose, this is one of those things. Somebody with a gun, yes, it was a trained security guard, but they stopped the threat before police even set foot on scene almost. Rose, this was remarkable. The other remarkable part, I guess, Robes, trying to wonder where his head was. Because the young lady that died, the young lady he shot, didn't die initially. And from what's being described, Robes, it sounds like she didn't have initially, we don't know, a mortal wound. Because she was still trying to get away. This part, I didn't understand. If he was there just to kill as many as possible, why spend the time he did on this woman?
00:10:25
Speaker 2: Yes, because she is, by all accounts, wounded but crawling. She was crawling to try and get away, to get to safety. And as she's crawling, his gun malfunctions. And you saw the video. He slowly, he's not even looking like he's in much of a hurry, goes back to his vehicle to retrieve another gun so that he can literally go back while she's still crawling to get away from him and shoot her dead.
00:10:52
Speaker 1: It doesn't make sense.
00:10:53
Speaker 2: Why?
00:10:53
Speaker 1: He didn't know her. He just, I will kill anybody. Now, the thing I did think about, Robes, is at this point, everybody's running. Everybody's gone from the scene. She might have been the only human being alive. inside at that point.
00:11:07
Speaker 2: Yeah, that might have been what it was, because after he finished and he killed her, he then entered, he was in the building, he was looking for the cafeteria, and he was about to walk into the cafeteria when that security guard took him out.
00:11:19
Speaker 1: And again, from what I see in the video, I think I've looked at most of it, you don't see this gunman near people. He is walking through empty halls around He enters a door. Nobody's around, right? Word had gotten out. Look, in that time that he shot this woman initially.
00:11:35
Speaker 3: Four minutes.
00:11:36
Speaker 1: Everybody's scrambling, and he takes the time. I never see him running in any video, right?
00:11:40
Speaker 2: Nope.
00:11:41
Speaker 1: Okay, so he goes and gets another one. All this is time ticking, and now people are getting farther and farther away from him. He goes back. He can't find a victim, bro, other than the one he left there. This woman crawling. This is a fucking HR lady. He didn't know that and didn't care. She has nothing to do with his $ 2, 556 that he owes.
00:12:02
Speaker 2: Nothing.
00:12:03
Speaker 1: And I think, wasn't it attached to like a Best Buy card or Best Buy account? So it's not even like it was.
00:12:09
Speaker 2: All I could think about, you know, your mind goes, because it's so sad that this young woman lost her life. But you just start thinking about what did he buy? What was that thing that he bought? that led to this $ 2, 500 debt that he was so upset about. I didn't even realize it was a Best Buy purchase.
00:12:28
Speaker 1: Well, stay with us, folks. The story gets a little more perplexing when you start hearing from the people who know this guy. Stay here.
00:12:46
Speaker 2: Welcome back, everyone, to Amy and TJ. What a horrific scene at the Citibank Center in Tampa. 35-year-old Jacob Pearson was angry about a $ 2, 500 debt.
00:12:59
Speaker 3: He was summoned to court.
00:13:00
Speaker 2: He was supposed to be in court today on Friday, but instead he threatened employees, drove to the center, and ended up killing, but just brutally, because he His gun jammed. He went back, got the gun, finished off 41-year-old Leanne Selman.
00:13:20
Speaker 3: She worked in HR.
00:13:22
Speaker 2: Her parents, I mean, just I've been reading the news articles, just they were watching on television, saw the place of business where their daughter worked, were desperately trying to call her cell phone, didn't get a response from her. And yes, a short time later, police ended up on their doorstep telling them that their daughter had been killed.
00:13:42
Speaker 3: I mean, just horrific.
00:13:44
Speaker 1: 3,200 people work at that complex, they say. And we're used to this with parents, right, who hear about a school shooting incident. And the school is off the street from them. And they try to tell parents, don't come here. And you naturally, oh, my God, is my kid in there? Is my kid okay? One in 3,200 chance. And it was their kid.
00:14:07
Speaker 2: It's just so, so sad. People have talked about how she was an accomplished dancer. She has a sister who lives in the area but was super close to her family. She had worked at Citibank for nine years.
00:14:18
Speaker 1: Just HR.
00:14:20
Speaker 2: Who would think going to work on a Thursday in Tampa at your HR job would end the way it did?
00:14:27
Speaker 3: It's just awful.
00:14:28
Speaker 1: The HR lady.
00:14:29
Speaker 2: Right?
00:14:30
Speaker 1: How are you going to be mad at the HR lady?
00:14:32
Speaker 3: She has such a great smile, too.
00:14:34
Speaker 2: I looked up her picture, and it just breaks your heart because it really puts a face to this name and to this story.
00:14:39
Speaker 3: And you can just see the warmth in her smile. And everyone described her.
00:14:43
Speaker 2: I believe the phrase used to describe her was that she was the bright light in every room.
00:14:48
Speaker 3: And look, when you hear people.
00:14:50
Speaker 2: Describe the suspect, the man who also eventually was, I guess he died in the hospital. He suffered five bullet wounds with that security guard disabling him. But Jacob Pearson, 35 years old, a young guy. But when you hear how people who knew him describe him, it's confusing.
00:15:09
Speaker 1: Young dad. Seven-year-old, I think. Seven-year-old daughter. People describe seeing him playing with her out in the complex. They used phrases like, it's quiet, nice. I haven't seen anything yet. Maybe something will come out, Robes. But I haven't seen anybody suggest anything odd about this guy.
00:15:26
Speaker 2: He didn't have a criminal record. There was no violent history. Obviously, he was a gun owner. But the concerning thing is, look, when we talk about 33,000-plus people working at this Citibank complex, 3,200, look, if he hadn't given the warning, if that security guard had not been where he was and able to find him and take him down, he had 90 rounds of ammunition, and I believe he got off 15, I believe is what they said. But the damage he could have done is just frightening.
00:15:59
Speaker 1: A gun malfunction. Thank God. I mean, I don't know what else to say about that, what divine intervention, the universe or whatever else. A gun malfunctioned, Robes. He could have sprayed that place. Those people took off. He needed time to go get it together. Robes, this could have been just awful because he had the intent.
00:16:23
Speaker 3: Yes, he did.
00:16:24
Speaker 1: To kill as many folks as he could.
00:16:25
Speaker 2: Indiscriminately. Didn't care who they were, what their stories were. He was that angry about being asked to pay $ 2, 500. What gets us there?
00:16:36
Speaker 1: A guy with no criminal record and nobody as of yet to say a foul word about him. How does this happen? Folks, be kind and be aware. Be aware of, I don't know, people in their troubles. Listen to them.
00:16:55
Speaker 2: Be kind.
00:16:55
Speaker 1: I mean, extend some kindness to people because folks are going through it, Robes, to the point that $ 2, 500 might have been the end of the world for him.
00:17:05
Speaker 2: Well, unfortunately, it was the end of the world for 41-year-old Leanne Selman and her family and certainly so many people there grieving. Who knows when employees will go back to work? I saw they were saying they don't expect people to come back for days.
00:17:18
Speaker 3: And look, can you imagine going back?
00:17:21
Speaker 2: The trauma that you would have experienced today Obviously for those who knew and worked with Leanne Selman, that's one thing, but just to have had that experience in that building to be running for your life, a gunman on the loose, that's just, you know, we obviously students have had to deal with this and go through these types of drills, but it's just one of those moments where you just, I couldn't even imagine going back into that building.
00:17:42
Speaker 1: There's still going to be crime scene.
00:17:45
Speaker 2: Yes.
00:17:45
Speaker 1: Bullet holes. They got to go through those same doors he did. They got to go through the cafeteria. They're going to have to What's going to happen to that courtyard outside? Yeah, there's going to be reminders everywhere. But that's just... Sorry for those folks. HR, they oftentimes, Robes, frankly, deal with every single person in the building. Certainly new hires and all kinds of stuff. So you know a lot of people knew this woman. So I hate that for you guys down there. What answers we can get, what we can learn out of this, I don't know yet. But again, hats off. What we learned is that we need to follow protocol and policies and that police work can... Can save lives and sometimes you just get lucky and a gun jams.
00:18:25
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're right. Well, with that, everyone, we always appreciate you listening to us. I'm Amy Robach alongside TJ Holmes.
00:18:31
Speaker 3: We'll talk to you soon.
Speaker 1: Hey there, folks. It is Friday, November 6th. $ 2, 500. That is what prompted a man to go irate, according to authorities, drive his car into a bank complex and start shooting. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ Robes. An attack we talked about in Tampa. that seemed potentially like it could have been a mass shooting situation. And then there ended up being one woman dead. So they said it was a target attack. We thought he was just targeting possibly One person. That ain't the case. Yes.
00:00:38
Speaker 2: It seemed like perhaps there was some sort of a relationship or a vendetta.
00:00:42
Speaker 1: First thing we thought, yeah.
00:00:43
Speaker 2: Right? That you would have a man go to such lengths to drive his car through the gate of this Citibank complex. And if you haven't seen the video, it's pretty remarkable. And then, yes, shoot and... almost kill a young woman, and then go back to the car to get a gun, because his gun jammed, to finish the job. Yeah, it seems like he wanted to go after one person, but we are learning oh so much more about his motive, and it was well beyond that.
00:01:16
Speaker 1: We got this word yesterday, and the video was out there, and it is terrifying stuff to see a man walking around in a complex where 3,000 people work in Tampa. This is the Citibank, they call it their complex, but it is a main a city bank center in Tampa. And so we got word about this. It happened on Wednesday, lunchtime. Folks were sitting outside in a little courtyard. You've seen this before. People in a big complex like this, they have tables set up outside for people to eat. And you see this gray sedan just speed through a median, speed through the fence, and a guy gets out and starts shooting. Now, that was the initial word robes and the details we got. A security guy or guard was there. Thank goodness. Armed security guard confronted this man in the cafeteria, shot him. The suspect was then taken to the hospital, later died. Now, that was the story we got. We had a lot of blinks we wanted to fill in, Robes, including a motive. And once police identified, at least publicly, who this suspect was and then start filling in these holes, what? What was going on that set him off to do this, Robes? I know things are tight But what was happening? $ 2, 500 is what they're saying caused all this.
00:02:32
Speaker 2: Yes, the backstory to this now is so hard to get your head around because, yes, apparently, yes, this man calls Citibank. because he got summons in the mail saying that he owed $ 2, 500 on his credit card, like credit card debt. So he calls Citibank and makes a threat.
00:02:54
Speaker 3: He gets so angry. He wants them to drop this lawsuit.
00:02:57
Speaker 2: He shouldn't have to pay them $ 2, 500. But he makes a specific threat at 9 a.m. on the call saying, unless you want me to go over there with my AR-15, my bulletproof vest, and my insanity, cancel this court case.
00:03:13
Speaker 1: Well, Robes, that's a.
00:03:15
Speaker 1: I don't know. They took it seriously. Sounds serious to me. You would have to think, who would say something like that? Ropes? But they took action.
00:03:27
Speaker 3: Yes.
00:03:27
Speaker 2: So Citibank, the attorney who was on the other side, end of that phone call, contacts security. Security contacts Orlando police. Orlando police decide to go do a welfare check, go to his home. His wife is there and he's gone. And his wife tells police, that her husband seemed angry when he left.
00:03:48
Speaker 1: Now, the next step that's done after this is that those authorities in Orlando get a hold of the law enforcement in Tampa, where the Citibank Center is. And so the sheriff's deputies just start heading that direction before any word of anything. They didn't get there before he did. But, Roves, there's something about this. We don't see this. Roves, that's good police response. Robes, it sounds like everything from the lawyer calling security, security calling the authorities, authorities calling the other authorities. Robes, it's kind of comforting to know that the proper protocols were in place and they followed them. That was nice to hear.
00:04:29
Speaker 2: It is, and obviously so many people, all of the steps taken along the way, clearly saved countless lives, especially when you start to hear the details of, what happened and where Jacob Pearson was about to enter when he was stopped by that security guard. But yes, sheriff deputies head to the Citibank Center in Tampa. Didn't he, didn't Pearson tell the attorney it's only about an hour drive? Didn't he even like describe that it wasn't that far for him to drive? So they had an idea that he might be headed to that facility?
00:05:01
Speaker 1: So again, if that calls at nine, this is about The time of day, it'll take you an hour and a half to do the drive, depending on traffic and exactly where he was leaving from. Yes, we're talking about two hours. Robes, that was a lot of time to calm down.
00:05:12
Speaker 3: That's what I was thinking.
00:05:13
Speaker 1: A lot of time.
00:05:14
Speaker 2: An hour and a half in the car, you're driving to a corporate headquarters of a bank where you actually have credit card debt.
00:05:22
Speaker 3: Like, you owe money. Whether he thought he did or not, okay.
00:05:25
Speaker 2: But that's... I mean, he's obviously in a state of mind or at least a state of function where he was able to drive for an hour and a half.
00:05:33
Speaker 3: It wasn't like he was.
00:05:34
Speaker 2: On drugs or drunk or in some sort of state that was substance-induced.
00:05:40
Speaker 3: He obviously was able.
00:05:41
Speaker 2: To collect his guns, get in the car, drive for an hour and a half, and then to still be that angry, to ram through the gate and then just, what, pick somebody out who was in the wrong place at the wrong time?
00:06:05
Speaker 1: How are you seething? How do you sustain that level of anger for two hours? Really, you're angry enough that you can kill somebody.
00:06:13
Speaker 2: A stranger who's actually done nothing to you individually.
00:06:16
Speaker 1: He stays with you for two hours. Babe, this is what was going on with him and Robles we see sometimes. What causes a mental break? This wasn't a guy who, there's no manifesto he left. They're not going through his online life.
00:06:30
Speaker 2: Right?
00:06:31
Speaker 1: Social media stuff to see if he had something planned. He didn't plan a mass shooting because he was mad at the world. He got a summons.
00:06:39
Speaker 3: Robes.
00:06:40
Speaker 1: That... What was it? That day? No, no, no. Excuse me. He was supposed to be in court on Friday.
00:06:43
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:06:44
Speaker 1: Today. Oh, shit.
00:06:44
Speaker 2: Here we are. Yeah.
00:06:46
Speaker 3: It was supposed to be today, but it's for... a $ 2, 500 debt.
00:06:50
Speaker 2: I'm not trying to minimize for somebody that $ 2, 500 might be like $ 250, 000 to someone else because if you don't have it, you don't have it. But still, I mean, to think that he might have to pay another fine or might have to have a payment plan put in place.
00:07:06
Speaker 1: What? People are, I know this is not an excuse, but people are on edge and people have been pushed to the edge and people have been fighting. And at some point you just Life is too much. It's overwhelming. Times are just hard.
00:07:18
Speaker 3: It's like the final straw.
00:07:20
Speaker 2: You know?
00:07:21
Speaker 3: Where you just snap.
00:07:22
Speaker 1: Now this too?
00:07:24
Speaker 3: Who knows what.
00:07:24
Speaker 2: Else was going on in his life that this just became the moment that he just stopped caring and was so angry he was willing to kill an innocent person and end his own life in the process. But it is remarkable when you talk about the heroes along the way. who absolutely saved other people from being killed because at 12, 11 PM, that is when the security camera catches him driving through that city bank center gate, crashing his vehicle. The deputies were on site in one minute. That is incredible because they were already looking for him.
00:08:02
Speaker 3: And at 12, 15 PM.
00:08:04
Speaker 2: So in four minutes from the time he crashed through that gate, a security guard fires, what, five shots at Pearson? I mean, they have surveillance cameras everywhere, and you can literally watch this happen moment to moment to moment. But he was about to enter the cafeteria where everybody, well, at least countless dozens and dozens of folks were in that cafeteria eating their lunch.
00:08:34
Speaker 1: Well, they and the security guard have to give him All the credit. Yes, there's a deputies were there in one minute and they weren't needed. Both the job had been done by the time they got there. Looks there. There's there's a reason there are armed security guards in some places for these moments and they go through their training. Look, I I my hat's off to everybody here. Every what they say, the head of security at Citibank is a former Secret Service guy.
00:09:01
Speaker 3: That's crazy.
00:09:02
Speaker 2: And when you can watch him, he's actually hiding in a men's bathroom. He's using the men's bathroom entrance, correct, as cover as he then gets out and shoots.
00:09:12
Speaker 3: But then it's pretty remarkable.
00:09:15
Speaker 2: Pearson, even though he gets hit with a couple of bullets, you can see he still picks up his gun and fires back at the security officer. The security officer 100% risked his life and put himself in harm's way.
00:09:26
Speaker 1: They do his job. Look, he did his job. I don't know. I mean, we think about that school shooting that the parent was on the 911 call, said, look, I'm about to go shoot this kid. You're telling me not to go in, but y'all ain't here. Rose, this is one of those things. Somebody with a gun, yes, it was a trained security guard, but they stopped the threat before police even set foot on scene almost. Rose, this was remarkable. The other remarkable part, I guess, Robes, trying to wonder where his head was. Because the young lady that died, the young lady he shot, didn't die initially. And from what's being described, Robes, it sounds like she didn't have initially, we don't know, a mortal wound. Because she was still trying to get away. This part, I didn't understand. If he was there just to kill as many as possible, why spend the time he did on this woman?
00:10:25
Speaker 2: Yes, because she is, by all accounts, wounded but crawling. She was crawling to try and get away, to get to safety. And as she's crawling, his gun malfunctions. And you saw the video. He slowly, he's not even looking like he's in much of a hurry, goes back to his vehicle to retrieve another gun so that he can literally go back while she's still crawling to get away from him and shoot her dead.
00:10:52
Speaker 1: It doesn't make sense.
00:10:53
Speaker 2: Why?
00:10:53
Speaker 1: He didn't know her. He just, I will kill anybody. Now, the thing I did think about, Robes, is at this point, everybody's running. Everybody's gone from the scene. She might have been the only human being alive. inside at that point.
00:11:07
Speaker 2: Yeah, that might have been what it was, because after he finished and he killed her, he then entered, he was in the building, he was looking for the cafeteria, and he was about to walk into the cafeteria when that security guard took him out.
00:11:19
Speaker 1: And again, from what I see in the video, I think I've looked at most of it, you don't see this gunman near people. He is walking through empty halls around He enters a door. Nobody's around, right? Word had gotten out. Look, in that time that he shot this woman initially.
00:11:35
Speaker 3: Four minutes.
00:11:36
Speaker 1: Everybody's scrambling, and he takes the time. I never see him running in any video, right?
00:11:40
Speaker 2: Nope.
00:11:41
Speaker 1: Okay, so he goes and gets another one. All this is time ticking, and now people are getting farther and farther away from him. He goes back. He can't find a victim, bro, other than the one he left there. This woman crawling. This is a fucking HR lady. He didn't know that and didn't care. She has nothing to do with his $ 2, 556 that he owes.
00:12:02
Speaker 2: Nothing.
00:12:03
Speaker 1: And I think, wasn't it attached to like a Best Buy card or Best Buy account? So it's not even like it was.
00:12:09
Speaker 2: All I could think about, you know, your mind goes, because it's so sad that this young woman lost her life. But you just start thinking about what did he buy? What was that thing that he bought? that led to this $ 2, 500 debt that he was so upset about. I didn't even realize it was a Best Buy purchase.
00:12:28
Speaker 1: Well, stay with us, folks. The story gets a little more perplexing when you start hearing from the people who know this guy. Stay here.
00:12:46
Speaker 2: Welcome back, everyone, to Amy and TJ. What a horrific scene at the Citibank Center in Tampa. 35-year-old Jacob Pearson was angry about a $ 2, 500 debt.
00:12:59
Speaker 3: He was summoned to court.
00:13:00
Speaker 2: He was supposed to be in court today on Friday, but instead he threatened employees, drove to the center, and ended up killing, but just brutally, because he His gun jammed. He went back, got the gun, finished off 41-year-old Leanne Selman.
00:13:20
Speaker 3: She worked in HR.
00:13:22
Speaker 2: Her parents, I mean, just I've been reading the news articles, just they were watching on television, saw the place of business where their daughter worked, were desperately trying to call her cell phone, didn't get a response from her. And yes, a short time later, police ended up on their doorstep telling them that their daughter had been killed.
00:13:42
Speaker 3: I mean, just horrific.
00:13:44
Speaker 1: 3,200 people work at that complex, they say. And we're used to this with parents, right, who hear about a school shooting incident. And the school is off the street from them. And they try to tell parents, don't come here. And you naturally, oh, my God, is my kid in there? Is my kid okay? One in 3,200 chance. And it was their kid.
00:14:07
Speaker 2: It's just so, so sad. People have talked about how she was an accomplished dancer. She has a sister who lives in the area but was super close to her family. She had worked at Citibank for nine years.
00:14:18
Speaker 1: Just HR.
00:14:20
Speaker 2: Who would think going to work on a Thursday in Tampa at your HR job would end the way it did?
00:14:27
Speaker 3: It's just awful.
00:14:28
Speaker 1: The HR lady.
00:14:29
Speaker 2: Right?
00:14:30
Speaker 1: How are you going to be mad at the HR lady?
00:14:32
Speaker 3: She has such a great smile, too.
00:14:34
Speaker 2: I looked up her picture, and it just breaks your heart because it really puts a face to this name and to this story.
00:14:39
Speaker 3: And you can just see the warmth in her smile. And everyone described her.
00:14:43
Speaker 2: I believe the phrase used to describe her was that she was the bright light in every room.
00:14:48
Speaker 3: And look, when you hear people.
00:14:50
Speaker 2: Describe the suspect, the man who also eventually was, I guess he died in the hospital. He suffered five bullet wounds with that security guard disabling him. But Jacob Pearson, 35 years old, a young guy. But when you hear how people who knew him describe him, it's confusing.
00:15:09
Speaker 1: Young dad. Seven-year-old, I think. Seven-year-old daughter. People describe seeing him playing with her out in the complex. They used phrases like, it's quiet, nice. I haven't seen anything yet. Maybe something will come out, Robes. But I haven't seen anybody suggest anything odd about this guy.
00:15:26
Speaker 2: He didn't have a criminal record. There was no violent history. Obviously, he was a gun owner. But the concerning thing is, look, when we talk about 33,000-plus people working at this Citibank complex, 3,200, look, if he hadn't given the warning, if that security guard had not been where he was and able to find him and take him down, he had 90 rounds of ammunition, and I believe he got off 15, I believe is what they said. But the damage he could have done is just frightening.
00:15:59
Speaker 1: A gun malfunction. Thank God. I mean, I don't know what else to say about that, what divine intervention, the universe or whatever else. A gun malfunctioned, Robes. He could have sprayed that place. Those people took off. He needed time to go get it together. Robes, this could have been just awful because he had the intent.
00:16:23
Speaker 3: Yes, he did.
00:16:24
Speaker 1: To kill as many folks as he could.
00:16:25
Speaker 2: Indiscriminately. Didn't care who they were, what their stories were. He was that angry about being asked to pay $ 2, 500. What gets us there?
00:16:36
Speaker 1: A guy with no criminal record and nobody as of yet to say a foul word about him. How does this happen? Folks, be kind and be aware. Be aware of, I don't know, people in their troubles. Listen to them.
00:16:55
Speaker 2: Be kind.
00:16:55
Speaker 1: I mean, extend some kindness to people because folks are going through it, Robes, to the point that $ 2, 500 might have been the end of the world for him.
00:17:05
Speaker 2: Well, unfortunately, it was the end of the world for 41-year-old Leanne Selman and her family and certainly so many people there grieving. Who knows when employees will go back to work? I saw they were saying they don't expect people to come back for days.
00:17:18
Speaker 3: And look, can you imagine going back?
00:17:21
Speaker 2: The trauma that you would have experienced today Obviously for those who knew and worked with Leanne Selman, that's one thing, but just to have had that experience in that building to be running for your life, a gunman on the loose, that's just, you know, we obviously students have had to deal with this and go through these types of drills, but it's just one of those moments where you just, I couldn't even imagine going back into that building.
00:17:42
Speaker 1: There's still going to be crime scene.
00:17:45
Speaker 2: Yes.
00:17:45
Speaker 1: Bullet holes. They got to go through those same doors he did. They got to go through the cafeteria. They're going to have to What's going to happen to that courtyard outside? Yeah, there's going to be reminders everywhere. But that's just... Sorry for those folks. HR, they oftentimes, Robes, frankly, deal with every single person in the building. Certainly new hires and all kinds of stuff. So you know a lot of people knew this woman. So I hate that for you guys down there. What answers we can get, what we can learn out of this, I don't know yet. But again, hats off. What we learned is that we need to follow protocol and policies and that police work can... Can save lives and sometimes you just get lucky and a gun jams.
00:18:25
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're right. Well, with that, everyone, we always appreciate you listening to us. I'm Amy Robach alongside TJ Holmes.
00:18:31
Speaker 3: We'll talk to you soon.