By Staff
MEMORIAL SERVICE Ken Storms, Meridian's chief administrative officer, escorts Shirley J. Price from a memorial service last Thursday honoring those killed in a shooting rampage July 8 at Lockheed Martin in Lauderdale County. Price's boyfriend, Doug Williams, killed or injured 15 people before taking his own life. Photo by Paula Merritt/The Meridian Star
By Fredie Carmichael / staff writer
July 16, 2003
The girlfriend of the man who shot and killed six co-workers at Lockheed Martin last week and injured eight others is no longer an employee at the Lauderdale County plant.
Shirley J. Price was not among more than 100 company employees who returned to the plant Tuesday, their first day back since fellow worker Doug Williams went on a shooting rampage July 8.
Sam Grizzle, a Lockheed Martin spokesman, wouldn't say if Price was fired or quit her job after working at the airplane parts plant for about 23 years. He did say she was no longer an employee.
Phone calls to Price's house today and Tuesday went unanswered. However, Price told the Associated Press on Tuesday that she was "severed from the company."
Price's comments came five days after she interrupted a memorial service in Meridian for the victims of the shooting. She complained that Williams wasn't among those honored.
At the plant on Tuesday, Lockheed Martin officials and employees gathered outside the plant for a memorial before returning to work. There, company president Dain Hancock spoke to workers.
Hancock told the employees he understood their pain. He said the company realized that some employees may not have been ready to return to work Tuesday.
Grizzle said later in the day that some employees decided to work.