On the morning of July 8, 2003, a mass shooting at the Lockheed Martin aerospace plant in Meridian, Mississippi claimed six lives, including 58-year-old employee Charles J. Miller. The shooter, 48-year-old co-worker Douglas Paul Williams, reportedly left a mandatory ethics and diversity training in an agitated state, retrieved firearms from his vehicle, and returned armed with a shotgun and a rifle. Over a roughly ten-minute rampage he shot 14 co-workers; six were killed and others wounded.

Co-workers later described Williams as having long-standing anger issues and racist attitudes, with threats said to have been made against Black colleagues nearly two years before the attack. Questions were raised about what management knew of his behavior before the shooting. In the years after the massacre Miller’s widow, Jinnell Miller, helped establish an annual Reconciliation Week in Meridian to honor the victims and promote healing.

If anyone worked at the plant at that time or has information about warnings raised before July 8, 2003, please share what is known.