Seated passenger dead; police searching for suspect — BART train shooting

A man was fatally shot on a BART train at the West Oakland Station Saturday night.

The shooting happened around 7:46pm inside a train vehicle at the station.

One woman wrote: “just saw a shooting at west oakland bart.it was inside a train on the platform opposite to mine”.

“The station will be open at 8 a.m., which is when service normally start on Sunday, BART police Lt. Aaron Ledford said early Sunday”.

A BART train is seen in this image taken from file video.

The suspect fled the train as some passengers frantically tried to save the shooting victim Saturday night, while others ran out of the train or got on the ground. On Sunday, many passengers were feeling scared about riding BART.

“He was in possession of some sort of knife”, Ledford said Sunday morning.

“People were screaming. It was chaos”, Chapin told Bay Area News Group.

BART spokesman Jim Allison confirmed this morning that the shooting was an isolated incident, and not related to a terrorist plot.

The suspect was described as a black male, 6-foot-3, slim build, bald head & wearing a green, hooded jacket & backpack.

25-year-old Brad Chapin, who was on the train at the time, told the Contra Costa Times, “Everyone just got down on the ground”.

Witnesses told KGO-TV that as the train approached the station, a disheveled man pulled a gun and shot a younger passenger seated next to the door.

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Anyone with information about the shooting is being asked to call BART police at (510) 464-7000.