Scott Dekraai

Scott Evans Dekraai (Born 1970) was the Seal Beach Shooter.

On Wednesday, October 12, 2011 at 1:21 p.m. PDT (20:21 UTC), police responded to reports of shots fired at the Salon Meritage hair salon at 500 Pacific Coast Highway. The alleged shooter was armed with three handguns, and reloaded at least once during the atack, which lasted two minutes. There were about twenty people in the salon at the time, some managing to escape by running into the street or hiding in neighboring businesses. Six people were declared dead at the scene, and three survivors were taken to a hospital where two of them later died of their wounds. Police later named the weapons used in the shooting as a 9mm Springfield XD, a .45-caliber Heckler & Koch HK45, and a Smith & Wesson .44 magnum.

The alleged shooter's former wife, Michelle Fournier, one of the employees at the salon, was also one of the victims. The suspect in the shooting, named by police as 41-year-old Scott Evans Dekraai of Huntington Beach, California, was arrested without incident after being stopped while driving a white pickup truck about one half mile (0.8km) from the scene of the crime. Dekraai was wearing body armor at the time of his arrest.

The incident was the worst shooting spree in Orange County since the Fullerton massacre in July 1976, in which seven people died. There had been only one murder in Seal Beach during the previous four years. A candlelight vigil was held in the evening of the next day for the victims of the shooting. A fund set up to aid victims of the shooting raised around $400,000. Sandi Fannin, the widow of the owner, stated that a remodeled version of the salon would open with the same name and in the same location during summer 2012.