8 die, including gunman, in Ohio shooting

COPLEY, Ohio -- A man apparently angry with his girlfriend gunned down two people outside a home and two more in a car yesterday morning, then shot the girlfriend in a rampage that left eight dead including the gunman, who was shot by police, authorities and witnesses said.

Two others were killed elsewhere, police said. A child, about 11, was among those shot, witnesses said. Investigators were trying to piece together what happened at four crime scenes, Copley police Chief Michael Mier said.

A neighbor, Gilbert Elie, said he was getting ready for church when he heard gunshots and cries for help in his northeast Ohio neighborhood, a wooded area outside Akron. He went to a house across the street and said he found a shocking scene: the woman who lived there lying in the driveway, her husband shot near the garage, and their young granddaughter and another woman shot in the front seat of a vehicle, the windows apparently blown out by gunfire.

A third woman came out of the house next door and tried to talk to Elie, he said, but their brief exchange ended abruptly when a man followed her out of the house and shot her, sending the 75-year-old Elie running for safety behind a truck. "She was talking to me, and he come up behind her and shot her, so I figured, maybe I'm next," he told The Associated Press.

He hid until he could see the gunman was gone. Police arrived, and Elie said he heard a round of shots and assumed officers killed the gunman. -- AP