After losing its headquarters in the attacks on the World Trade Center just over one year ago, Empire Blue Cross and Blue Shield suffered another blow yesterday. Three employees were shot to death at the firm’s new headquarters in midtown Manhattan, the company said.
The motive was not immediately clear but the police suspected a murder-suicide, according to news reports.
“It was a self-contained incident stemming from a dispute between the three employees involved,” the company said in a statement.
The incident began at about 8:20 a.m. when a former FBI agent and vice president in the firm’s fraud investigations unit called two co-workers into his office on the 11th floor of 1440 Broadway where he shot them to death and then killed himself, according to reports.
The vice president, a man in his 50’s, had a relationship with one of the victims, a woman in her 30’s. The other victim was a man, also in his 30’s, the report said.
The employees had not been identified pending notification of family members.
Empire Blue Cross occupies the 10th, 11th and 12th floors of the 25-story building. The firm’s offices were closed immediately following the incident.
Crisis counselors are expected to be on-site at all Empire Blue Cross offices and a toll-free hotline for crisis counseling has been activated for employees. Outbound calls were made to all employees working at 1440 Broadway, the company said.
Empire Blue Cross had occupied offices on 10 floors in 1 World Trade Center
Network
