LOS ANGELES _ The gunman whose 2013 rampage at Los Angeles International Airport left a Transportation Security Administration officer dead and three other people injured was sentenced Monday to life in prison for the premeditated, deadly attack in which he targeted federal officers.
Paul Ciancia, 26, had pleaded guilty to murder and other charges earlier this year as part of a deal in which federal prosecutors withdrew their decision to seek the death penalty for the shootings at the airport's bustling Terminal 3.
At Monday's hearing, Ciancia spoke unapologetically about the violence, saying he had wanting to commit suicide but only after spending the remainder of his life savings. Doing little more than watching news programs on TV, he said, he became interested in the debate over gun control and concluded, "I need to get a gun."
He referred to being previously harassed by Los Angeles police but gave no specifics, and he indicated that the harassment led him on a path toward violence.
"I knew exactly how I was going to die. I was going to take up arms against my own government," he said.
He said he targeted TSA officers after coming to believe they were harassing people, including disabled people.
"I wanted to make a statement!" he said in court, his voice rising.
He apologized to the teacher who was among three people wounded in the rampage, expressing deep regret. But he never mentioned the impact of the shooting on the TSA officer he killed or two other officers who were wounded.
Ciancia, who grew up in the suburbs of Philadelphia and moved to Los Angeles about 18 months before the attack, harbored an odd, dangerous fixation on TSA officers, who screen travelers at the nation's airports. Although they are not armed and have little authority, court records show Ciancia targeted them for what he saw as their unpatriotic ways.
Following the attack, investigators found a handwritten note inside Ciancia's luggage in which he railed against the TSA for its "Nazi checkpoints" and the presumption that "every American is a terrorist." The rampage would be a success, he wrote, if he managed to kill a TSA worker.
"There wasn't a terrorist attack," he wrote to his sister shortly before the attack. "There was a pissed off patriot trying to water the tree of liberty."
At about 9:15 a.m. on Nov. 1, 2013, Ciancia was dropped off by an unsuspecting roommate in front of the third of LAX's nine terminals. He walked through the doors and from a case he had fashioned from pieces of luggage, Ciancia pulled out a semiautomatic rifle he had purchased months earlier.
Instead of shooting wildly into the crowd of travelers, Ciancia took aim at TSA Officer Gerardo I. Hernandez, who was near a podium checking passengers' travel documents before they went on to a security checkpoint on the floor above, according to court papers.
Ciancia shot Hernandez, who fell to the floor; the gunman then went up an escalator to the security checkpoint.
Seeing that Hernandez was still alive, Ciancia walked back down the upward-moving escalator, stood over the TSA officer and fired more rounds at him. Hernandez was shot 12 times in total, according to court papers.
Ciancia then climbed the stairs to the security checkpoint, opening fire on two more TSA officers, who tried to flee alongside panicked travelers toward the terminal's gate area. Both officers suffered non-life-threatening gunshot wounds; a traveler was shot in the leg.
Moving deeper into the terminal, Ciancia reportedly asked cowering people whether they worked for TSA. Other passengers fled onto the tarmac.
Within minutes, police officers confronted Ciancia, shooting him in the head. After life-saving surgery and weeks of recovery, Ciancia was put behind bars where he has remained since. Authorities recovered a total of 500 rounds of ammunition Ciancia brought to the airport.
Hernandez, a father of two children, was the first TSA officer slain on duty since the agency was created in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in an attempt to tighten security in American transportation networks.
The chaotic and disorganized response to the shooting by emergency personnel led to a highly critical report on the event that found widespread problems rooted in the failure of various police and fire departments to communicate with each other.
In recent court filing, prosecutors from the U.S. attorney's office made vague references to mental health problems suffered by Ciancia that were discussed at length in a sealed report.
"The government does not dispute that defendant has some combination of disorders ... and concurs that he has had suicidal ideation in the past," wrote Assistant U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald.
Fitzgerald added that Ciancia has shown no remorse for the shooting rampage and remains "resolute regarding his continuing 'hatred' of at least certain federal employees."
