Illinois CCW News

FBI agent kills shooter at East Peoria sports bar

MATT BUEDEL/Journal Star

Police on Saturday night were investigating a shooting at The Fifth Quarter sports bar on Illinois Route 116 across from the Par-A-Dice.

By Matt Buedel, Updated Jun 14, 2014 at 11:52 PM

EAST PEORIA — An off-duty FBI agent may have averted a mass-shooting Saturday night when a gunman walked into a sports bar packed with patrons attending a high school reunion and shot his ex-wife and her new boyfriend.

The gunman was killed when the agent, whom police would only officially identify as an off-duty law enforcement officer and subsequently asked not to be named, shot the suspect after gunfire erupted about 8 p.m. at the Fifth Quarter Sports Bar and Pizzaria.

The suspect and the two targets of his initial burst of gunfire ultimately died — the suspect at the scene and the other man and woman at a Peoria hospital.

East Peoria Police Chief Dick Ganschow said investigators were reviewing video of the incident recorded at the bar, and crime scene investigators were gathering evidence. Interviews of friends and relatives of the shooter and the victims will continue in the coming days to determine the background that led to the deadly shooting.

Lori A. Moore, 33, of Morton was pronounced dead at 9:16 p.m. at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center, according to Peoria County Coroner Johnna Ingersoll. Moore had a gunshot wound to the head, the coroner said.

The man who was transported to the hospital was pronounced dead at 9:39 p.m., also from an apparent gunshot wound to the head. He was a 36-year-old Peorian, but his next of kin could not be immediately located and his name was not released.

Autopsies for the pair will be scheduled for Sunday or Monday, Ingersoll said.

Moore filed for a divorce from Jason A. Moore in Peoria County in March 2013, according to court records. The dissolution of marriage and parenting agreement were final in May 2013.

The shooting incident happened about 8 p.m. Saturday at the establishment at 1110 N. Main St., just across Illinois Route 116 from the Par-A-Dice Hotel and Casino. A heavy police presence remained on scene for hours after the gunfire erupted.

“After just a brief moment inside the bar, he pulled out a weapon and shot a female and a male,” Ganschow said of the suspect. “He was subsequently shot.”

Multiple sources, including a person at the scene who declined to be identified, said the shooter was the ex-husband of the woman who was shot. The other male who was shot was the woman’s new boyfriend. They were attending a high school reunion.

A group of people on motorcycles wearing regalia of the Outlaw Motorcycle Club left the bar immediately after the shooting and was followed by police to a clubhouse on Farmington Road in Peoria County. Police later said they were witnesses to the incident, and not suspects.

Dozens of police and other emergency response vehicles blocked the portion of Main Street that led from the entrance to a Shell gas station at the Route 116 intersection to the sports bar.

A crowd of onlookers gathered on the other side of Route 116 and near the entrance of the gas station, where police strung yellow crime scene tape from the side of the building to prevent witnesses from leaving the sports bar parking lot. A couple tearfully embraced over the tape, and police later lifted the yellow cordon to allow vehicles to depart one-by-one.

Matt Buedel can be reached at 686-3154 or mbuedel@pjstar.com. Follow him on Twitter @JournoBuedel. 

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