Carl Robert Brown

Carl Robert Brown (November 26, 1930 – August 20, 1982) was an American teacher and mass murderer who fatally shot eight people and injured another three in a Miami welding shop on August 20, 1982. He was later fatally shot by two witnesses while cycling away from the scene.

Biography Brown was born on November 26, 1930, in Chicago, Illinois. He joined the U.S. Navy and was honorably discharged in 1954. People later stated that Brown always kept a military bearing about himself and was quite militaristic. In 1955, he moved from Chicago to Florida, where he graduated from the University of Miami in 1957 and in 1964 from East Carolina College in Greenville, North Carolina, earning a master's degree in education. After working briefly for Keyes Realty, he got a full-time job as a history teacher at Hialeah Junior High School in 1962 and was transferred to Drew Middle School, a school with a black majority, in 1981. There he taught American history until March 3, 1982, when he was relieved of his teaching duties for medical leave to treat his psychiatric problems.

Though neighbors described Brown as a quiet, kind and helpful man, who was working hard to keep his duplex neat and clean, and praising him overall as a landlord, it was also said that he made a habit of walking into other people's yards early in the morning, waking them by yelling "United States!" and that during the night, shots were heard from his house. It was also reported that he once broke a window when firing a pellet gun, and picked grapefruit from a neighbor's tree wearing only his underwear. Apparently, he also collected aluminum cans.

After a trip abroad, which he had taken shortly before the shooting, he came back in worse shape than before and stated that nothing in the United States stood for anything.

According to his former wife, Sylvia, Brown asked to return to work two days prior to the shooting, but his psychiatrist, who later stated that Brown showed no aggressiveness at that time, declined his request. Realizing that his complaints were of no avail, Brown left the shop, stating that he would come in and kill everybody; no one took him seriously.

Early the next day Brown went to a gun store a few blocks from his home in Hialeah and purchased two shotguns, a semi-automatic rifle and ammunition. An hour before starting his rampage, Brown invited his 10-year-old son to join him in "killing a lot of people" telling him that the final destination would be Hialeah Junior High School.

Shortly before 11:00 a.m. he arrived at the welding shop on his bicycle, wearing a Panama hat and carrying one of the shotguns, which was initially mistakenly identified as a 12 gauge Mossberg 500 Persuader but was later identified as an Ithaca 37 with a pistol grip, slung over his shoulder. He entered the shop through a side door and began shooting while yelling that he would send everybody to Germany. According to police, Brown walked through the building methodically shooting everyone, most of the time at close range and sometimes twice, leaving three victims in the office and others in the work area and the driveway in front of the shop. In the end, six of the eleven employees present were dead and two more dying, while three who were injured managed to escape and jump into the car of a passing motorist, who took them to a gas station a mile away and called for help. Out of ammunition, Carl Brown left the store, got back on his bicycle and started cycling away, apparently towards Hialeah Junior High School. According to a witness, Brown "looked very passive and very nonchalant" and "wasn't trying to escape, just casually leaving the crime scene." Another witness put it this way: "He got on his bike and pedaled off as if he was going for a stroll on North River Drive."

When Mark Kram, an employee at a nearby metal shop, was told of the massacre, he grabbed a .38 revolver and set out to pursue the shooter in his car. Down the street he picked up Ernest Hammett, who was trying to flag down cars, and together they tried to find the perpetrator. Six blocks away from the crime scene, near Miami International Airport, they caught up with Brown, and Kram, according to himself, fired a warning shot "over his (Brown's) head",

Police found a cassette tape in Brown's house, where he called himself "Logos", a mythical figure he considered to be the controlling principle of the universe - "This is the Logos speaking. God through me is responsible for the good and bad sounds in your head." "Now I shall say a few good words in your head before I return you to the bad sounds in your head...The Logos is the spark of God, the most logical. I am indestructible on Earth."

No charges were filed against Kram.