Former newspaper publisher says he had 'serious concerns' about Annapolis shooting suspect years ago

The scene outside the Capital Gazette building.

(Image credit: Alex Wroblewski/Getty Images)

last updated 29 June 2018

Law enforcement officials have identified Jarrod W. Ramos, 38, of Laurel, Maryland, as the suspect in Thursday's deadly shooting at the Capital Gazette newsroom in Annapolis.

In 2012, Ramos filed a defamation lawsuit against Capital Gazette Communications, former columnist Eric Hartley, and former editor and publisher Thomas Marquardt, in response to an article Hartley wrote in 2011 about a criminal harassment charge against Ramos. The article described Ramos as a U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics employee with no previous criminal record, who started talking to a former high school classmate online. Over the course of a year, he tried to become her friend, but ended up telling her to kill herself and then allegedly called her work in an attempt to get her fired. He pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor harassment charge.

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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

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