The scene inside Kirkwood City Council chambers during the Feb. 7, 2008, shootings. (Cara DiMichele/P-D)

May 2007: Moscow, Idaho — A sniper opens fire on a local courthouse, killing a police officer, wounding two others. The attacker then kills a caretaker at a nearby church, then himself.

August 2005: Fort Worth, Texas — Inside City Hall, Ray Redding fires a 9mm semiautomatic at the city development director. Redding misses.

March 2005: Atlanta — Brian Nichols fires a gun inside the Fulton County courthouse. He kills four people and takes a woman hostage before he is arrested.

July 2003: New York City — Othniel Boaz Askew, rival to councilman James Davis, shoots and kills Davis in the second floor of City Hall. Askew is shot and killed by police.

May 2002: Milwaukee — Laron Ball jumps from the jury box and heads toward a window after hearing that he was convicted of murder. During a scuffle, he grabs a gun from a sheriff's deputy and wounds him. A policeman who testified against Ball shoots and kills him.

Oct. 1998: Riverside, Calif. — Ex-city employee Joseph L. Neale Jr. takes the mayor and City Council hostage in a small conference room where they were holding a morning meeting. Two council members, the mayor and two police officers are shot. Neale also is shot.

October 1993: Mound City, Ill. — John Rose shoots Wallace Bobo, a retired basketball coach, as Bobo leaves the Pulaski County Courthouse. A judge denied Bobo's prosecution on charges of fondling one of Rose's two daughters in 1989. Bobo survives; he is later convicted of molesting another girl in 1994.

August 1993: Topeka, Kan. — Jack Gary McKnight steps off the elevator at a federal courthouse firing handguns and throwing homemade bombs. He kills a security guard and injures five other people before detonating a bomb that kills him.

April 1993: San Francisco — During a court recess, Ellie Nesler shoots Daniel Mark Driver five times in the head while he is shackled to a chair, killing him. Driver was facing charges that he molested several boys, including Nesler's son.

May 1992: Grand Forks, N.D. — A man in court for a child support hearing shoots and wounds Judge Lawrence Jahnke. The gunman, Reuben Larson, is later captured in a rural area of North Dakota.

May 1992: Clayton, Mo. — Kenneth M. Baumruk, while in a divorce hearing, fatally shoots his wife at the St. Louis County Courthouse. Baumruk also wounds his lawyer, her lawyer, a security officer and a bailiff. Baumruk is shot nine times by police during a running gunbattle. He survives and is convicted of murder in May 2001.

May 1988: Edwardsville, Ill. — Walter L. Janssen of Bethalto shoots his estranged wife five times in the Madison County Courthouse parking lot before committing suicide. Sherrie M. Janssen recovered from her wounds.