Details have continued to emerge after a disgruntled female YouTube user shot three people and herself at the Youtube Headquarters in San Bruno, California yesterday. Late last night, we reported that the shooter had been identified as Nasim Aghdam, 39, who ran a YouTube channel but became angry at the platform after several of her videos were reportedly demonetized. CNN reports that police have yet to determine a motive. However, investigators are looking into videos that appear to show Aghdam speaking critically of YouTube for keeping her videos from getting more views.
Furthermore, TMZ reports that Aghdam spoke to police just hours before she stormed the YouTube headquarters with a gun. Aghdam’s father, Ismail Aghdam, told TMZ that he and his family reported his daughter missing, and early on Tuesday morning police contacted him to tell him she had been found asleep in her car in Mountain View, California.
Aghdam’s brother spoke to a local CNN affiliate and admitted he had been worried that she would do something dangerous over the weekend when she stopped answering her phone and her car was found in Mountain View, California, more than 700 miles away from San Diego, where she lived.
When Mountain View police found Aghdam, they ran her plates and connected her to the missing person report, but did not notice anything else out of the ordinary. They contacted her family and took no further action. It was only hours later that she made it to San Bruno and shot and injured three people before killing herself.
San Bruno police chief Ed Barberini spoke of the matter on Good Morning America today. "We know that she was reported missing by her family in San Diego on the 31st of March, and that she was located in a community about 30 miles south of us early Tuesday morning," he said. "I don't know what concerns were conveyed to that police department, or how or where those concerns were relayed to. So that is something we're looking into."
BBC reports that in one of her YouTube channels, Aghdam described herself as a “vegan bodybuilder and animal rights activist” who enjoyed a “healthy and humane lifestyle.” Her website listed Turkish, Farsi, and English language YouTube channel and it appears she had thousands of subscribers across her accounts. She uploaded at least one video in which she heavily criticized YouTube for censoring her content and causing her to have fewer views on her videos. Her father said she had become angry when YouTube stopped paying her for uploading her video. Her father also allegedly told police as much, warning that she had a specific vendetta against YouTube.
"Videos of targeted users are filtered and merely relegated, so that people can hardly see their videos," she said in one video. "There is no equal growth opportunity on YouTube or any other video sharing site. Your channel will grow if they want [it] to!"
YouTube Shooting Suspect Nasim Aghdam uploaded this video to her Facebook account - criticizing the company for age-restricting, filtering and demonetizing her videos. pic.twitter.com/3mwuFl5vnE
There has been no information released yet about the three victims. The Verge reports that one victim was listed in fair condition, while another was considered in serious condition, and the third in critical condition. A fourth person had been treated for a twisted ankle. Aghdam was found dead inside the YouTube building from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
