ORANGE PARK, Fla. – The workers inside an Orange Park business when a colleague opened fire Monday morning flooded 911 with frantic calls as they ran for their lives.
Those calls were released Wednesday by the Clay County Sheriff's Office
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James Cameau, who had only been working at Jacksonville Granite for a few weeks, left work and went to the hotel room where he was staying and retrieved a gun, according to the Clay County Sheriff's Office.
Cameau returned about noon to the business on Industrial Loop West where about 10 employees worked.
Clay County Undersheriff Craig Aldrich said Cameau pointed the gun at several co-workers working outside the building, told them to run and then pulled the trigger.
The gun jammed twice. The third time, Cameau was able to fire off several rounds, hitting Dean Hagins Jr. as he was running away, Aldrick said. Cameau also fired at business owner Mike Rich's truck as he arrived at the scene.
Cameau then locked himself in a room where he could monitor the business's video cameras and killed himself.
One 911 caller provided some details about what led up to the shooting.
Dispatcher: Was he disgruntled or anything?
Caller: Uh, yeah, he was this morning. He said something -- he and I were kind of friends. He came in and goes, 'I know what's going on.' And I'm like, 'What are you talking about?' He says, 'I know what's going on. You've been playing both sides' or something like that. I was like, 'What?' And I just kind of ignored him.”
Another co-worker who called 911 said Cameau fired two shots outside and was “walking around like he was crazy.”
Caller: He hasn't come back out yet. The door is shut. It's unlocked. He was walking in and out but there's no people.
Dispatcher: Anybody screaming?
Caller: Oh, they're hiding. They're hiding over.. across from us ma'am.
Another 911 call came from a man in a neighboring house, who helped Hagins as he ran from the scene.
Hagins, the only person Cameau shot other than himself, took a bullet in the backside as he ran. He was released from Orange Park Medical Center on Tuesday afternoon.
Hagins said his adrenaline kicked in as he jumped a fence to get away from Cameau, and he is thankful that the neighbor on the other side was home and willing to help him.
That neighbor, Ruben Guengue, called 911 to report the shooting and then handed the phone to Hagins when the dispatcher asked to speak with him.
Dispatcher: Hello, what's going on there? How'd you get shot?
Hagins: I'm at work, right. Jacksonville Granite.
Dispatcher: Somebody come in and shot you?
Hagins: A man shot me. He works with us. I don't know.
Dispatcher: What's his name? What is his name?
Hagins: I don’t know his name ma'am. I just started a week ago.
Dispatcher: OK, you just started a week ago? Stay on the line. I'm going to put Fire-Rescue on the line with you.
Investigators later said there would have been more victims if the .22-caliber handgun Cameau was using hadn't jammed because he was using the wrong ammunition.
"Fortunately, he had loaded two different types of ammunition in this particular gun and that ammunition did not match that type of gun," Aldrick said. "It was there, by the grace of God, that those two individuals were not killed at that particular scene."
VIDEO: Undersheriff Aldrich talks about workplace shootings
Rich told News4Jax that the shooting was unexpected, scary and could have been a lot worse.
"There are about 12 of these mass shootings throughout a given year; 60 percent of them are occurring within a business ... or an education building, so it really drives the point home. You need to have a plan ahead of time and be able to respond and act on that plan," Aldrick said. "In this particular situation, in regards to the hiding part, you need to be able to secrete yourself in a room, in a closet, lock off the entrances, turn out the lights, silence your cell phones and really stay put. Hunker down until law enforcement gets there."
Cameau had one arrest on his record, a DUI charge in Duval County in 2006.
Cameau left previous job after altercation with superiors
News4Jax learned Cameau worked at Woodsman Kitchen and Floors from September 2012 until last August, when he resigned.
The owner of Woodsman told News4Jax that Cameau was a good employee up until the last six months, when he became really challenging to work with.
The owner didn't want to give an interview because he "didn't want to cause any more grief," but did say that Cameau thought people were watching him and felt there was discrimination going on.
Cameau filed a complaint against Woodsman after he left.
Surveillance camera records people running for their lives
A camera at a neighboring businesses recorded the people running from Jacksonville Granite after the shooting started and Clay County deputies arriving and pulling their guns.
James Carver, owner of S&S Salvage and a former police officer, said he was at lunch with some of his employees when he ran into an officer he knew at the restaurant who told him not to go back to his business.
When he did finally return, he reviewed his surveillance video and saw people running from the building.
"We got like 20 or 30 minutes of that, and then the police arrived," Carver said. "I thought it was kind of, kind of a really dramatic incident to occur this close to our business."
Surveillance video from inside Jacksonville Granite is being kept by the Clay County Sheriff's Office for its investigation.
"I was glad it wasn't worse than it was," Carver said. "We hear about these incidents all the time, and they're terrible. We don't understand why people do it, but it happens all the time."