34-year-old Aaron Alexis, the suspected gunman in the mass shooting that left 12 dead and many more injured at the Washington Navy Yard on Monday, was born in Queens, and was seen as a quiet person, NBC New York reported.
"It's a shocking experience, nobody expected this. No one saw this coming, no one knew anything. So all of this is just shocking," Anthony Little, who is Alexis' brother in law told, told NBC 4 New York.
"From what I know he was a regular guy," said Little. "Went to school, was in the service, from what I know, he was in the Navy."
Alexis also reportedly attended Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, working as a network technician at SinglePoint Technologies.
The Navy said that Alexis was a full-time reservist between 2007 and 2011. Before joining the Navy, in May 2004, Alexis was arrested in Seattle for shooting out the tires of another man's car after a dispute concerning parking, Seattle police said.
He was also arrested in September 2010 for discharging a firearm in Fort Worth, Texas.
Alexis had also been awarded the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal and National Defense Service Medal, according to The Daily Mail.
Alexis launched the mass shooting on Monday, potentially with another gunman, spraying office workers with bullets in the cafeteria and in the hallways at the heavily secured military installation in the heart of the nation's capital, authorities said, as reported by NBC News.
At least 12 people were killed including Alexis. Investigators said they had not established a motive for the shooting rampage, which unfolded less than four miles from the White House.
"We don't have any reason to think that at this stage," Mayor Vincent Gray said.
His father told detectives that his son may have post traumatic stress disorder.
''Those events disturbed him,' the police documents said, adding his son had experienced rage issues.
