Kevin Janson Neal

Kevin Janson Neal (1973 – November 14, 2017) was the perpetrator of the Rancho Tehama Reserve shootings on November 13 and 14, 2017. Five people were killed and 18 others were injured at eight separate crime scenes, including an elementary school. After being cornered by law enforcement officials, Neal committed suicide by shooting himself above his left eye.

Background
Kevin Janson Neal was raised in Cary, North Carolina. He attended East Carolina University from August 2001 to May 2004 but did not qualify for a degree and never declared a major. Relatives said Neal, who moved to California in 2005, had a history of mental illness and anger management issues, as well as an obsession with conspiracy theories. His mother had reportedly noticed a decline in his mental health since 2016.

Neighbors complained to police about Neal firing guns from his property, but whenever sheriff's deputies visited his doorstep, Neal would not respond to their knocking. A neighbor later said he believed Neal might have been testing the response time of law enforcement. In total, deputies were called to Neal's Bobcat Lane home 21 times for various reasons in 2016 and 2017.

On January 31, 2017, Neal was arrested and charged with two felonies, and five misdemeanors, after stabbing neighbor Hailey Poland, assaulting her mother-in-law, and snatching a mobile phone away from them. He was held on a US$160,000 bail bond, which was posted by his mother. His mother also spent $10,000 on legal fees to secure his release. Following his release, Neal continued to harass the neighbors, causing them to successfully seek a restraining order that required him to surrender his firearms and not purchase additional guns. He handed over a single pistol and attested that he had no other guns. Police said that, despite this, he illegally manufactured the guns he used in the shootings. Ghost guns are currently legal to manufacture in California, but the terms of Neal's restraining order made it illegal for him to possess them, or any other guns. Since January 31, 2018, ghost guns require a serial number in California. The two handguns that Neal possessed during his shooting rampage were not registered to him.

The day before the shootings, Neal called his mother to tell her he was "fed up" with his neighbors, whom he suspected of making methamphetamine. He had previously attempted to report his neighbors to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. One of the neighbors involved in the January 31 incident later became one of those killed in the shootings. Although Danny Elliott had meth in his system when Neal killed him and had been put on probation in 2016 for a misdemeanor charge of possessing drug paraphernalia, sheriff's deputies and California Fire officials said they never found evidence of a meth operation, despite multiple visits to Bobcat Lane.

Shooting spree
The killings started on November 13 at Neal's home in Rancho Tehama Reserve, 6970 Bobcat Lane at Fawn Lane, when Neal shot his wife, Barbara Glisan (aka Gilsan) and hid her body under some floorboards.

The next day Neal went on a shooting rampage, first killing a man and a woman, both neighbors with whom he had an ongoing feud over their suspected methamphetamine dealing.

After killing his neighbors, Neal stole a pickup truck that belonged to one of his victims. He then began firing at random vehicles and pedestrians. At an intersection, he bumped the truck into a vehicle carrying a woman and her three sons. He then drove up to the driver's side, and fired into it, injuring all of them with gunshots or flying glass. The woman was shot five times, four near her heart. She was carrying a gun and had a license to carry, but she was unable to shoot at Neal because he drove away quickly. She stopped four motorists to help her get to the hospital, but they drove off. She finally received aid from an assistant deputy sheriff who called for an ambulance.

At the Rancho Tehama Elementary School, Sarah Lobdell, the school's secretary, heard the gunfire near the school and quickly ordered the school to go on lockdown. A school custodian and the teachers put it into action. Neal crashed the pickup truck through the front gates of the school. He exited the vehicle with a self-assembled AR-15-type semi-automatic rifle, ran into the center of the school's quadrangle, and fired repeatedly at windows and walls. One of Neal's neighbors later claimed that Neal was targeting the seven-year-old son of the neighbor he killed earlier. One student hiding under a classroom desk was shot and injured by a bullet that penetrated a wall. A six-year-old student was also injured by a gunshot to the chest. A woman was also shot when she attempted to distract Neal from the school. Nearly 100 rounds of ammunition were fired into the school. Recorded video shows Neal going into a field behind the school and firing into the air, apparently in frustration at being locked out of the classrooms. Afterwards, Neal apparently discarded the rifle outside the school.

After fleeing the school, Neal crashed the pickup truck into another vehicle and fired at the two occupants as they tried to flee; the female driver was killed, and her husband was wounded in the legs. The man survived after pleading with Neal for his life. A passerby, unaware of the shootings, stopped his car and asked Neal if he was okay; Neal shot and wounded him, stole his car, and continued the rampage, killing another person.

As Neal was chasing an innocent victim and shooting at them from his car, he was being pursued by law enforcement. The stolen truck was ultimately rammed by two law enforcement officers, one from the Corning Police Department, who responded from the city of Corning to assist the sheriff's office, and a Tehama County Sheriff's deputy. As the truck came to a stop Neal attempted to ambush and kill the officers who exchanged heavy gunfire with him. Neal then killed himself with a shot above his left eye. The 25-minute attack took place at eight crime scenes using one semi-automatic ghost rifle and two semi-automatic pistols. His motive is unclear. Two handguns and another AR-15-type rifle were recovered near his body. The handguns were not registered to him. The first shooting report to 9-1-1 was placed at 7:54 a.m., and Neal died at 8:19 a.m.—a duration of 25 minutes.