SAN JOSE — Authorities say an extracurricular gambling debt between two bus drivers fueled a fatal shooting at a Valley Transportation Authority bus yard this weekend, rattling an agency scarred by a historic mass shooting three years ago that also involved an employee who targeted his colleagues.
At a news conference Monday at the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office — which provides police services for VTA — sheriff’s Capt. Sugey Jaimez disclosed that the shooting suspect and victim worked together and that “the motive had to do with money owed between the two from their betting activities which had nothing to do with their employment.”
The shooting was reported around 9:40 p.m. Friday in the parking lot of the VTA Chaboya Division Yard on South 7th Street near Tully Road in San Jose. Police, fire and emergency personnel responded to the call and found a man suffering from gunshot injuries; he was pronounced dead at the scene.
The Santa Clara County Medical Examiner-Coroner’s Office has not formally released his name, but listed the victim as a 45-year-old San Jose resident. VTA Carolyn Gonot said he was the father of two teenage children.
Duc Minh Bui, 33, of San Jose, has been arrested in connection with the fatal shooting of a co-worker on Sept. 20, 2023 at a VTA bus yard in San Jose. (Courtesy of the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office)
In the shooting’s immediate aftermath, a union leader said VTA employees scrambled to find out what had happened, as some were just getting off work and sharing information through text messages. The agency pledged mental health and counseling services to employees, and announced stepped-up security at VTA facilities.
On Sunday, the sheriff’s office announced that it had arrested 33-year-old Duc Minh Bui at his San Jose home just after noon, and booked him into jail on suspicion of murder. The agency did not disclose the connection between Bui and the victim, but did confirm that the two knew each other.
That arrest came a day after a Saturday morning news conference called by VTA officials and union leaders in which they described the shooting as an isolated, targeted encounter. It was an unusually swift public response likely informed by the last VTA workplace shooting, three years ago, which holds the unenviable distinction of being the deadliest mass shooting in Bay Area history.
In May 2021, a disgruntled VTA mechanic shot and killed nine of his coworkers at the VTA Guadalupe rail yard in San Jose before fatally shooting himself. That site was next door to the sheriff’s headquarters on Younger Avenue where Monday’s news conference was held. The building where most of the killings occurred was dismantled by the agency two years ago.
Related Articles
East Bay man pleads guilty to 2016 murder of San Francisco Conservation Corps worker
Woman dead after jumping from moving car on I-580 in Livermore
‘I f—ing love you’: Bay Area woman gets 3-year prison term for killing allegedly abusive boyfriend
Recent burglary is the latest challenge for 77-year-old East Bay flower shop
After San Mateo Court complaint, civil rights group is profanely assailed in secret — by their supposed allies
The shooting prompted calls for long-term improvements to workplace safety and increased security at VTA work sites. It also elicited criticisms about whether systemic problems led to failures to identify red flags leading up to the shooting, inflamed by a VTA-commissioned report that largely absolved the agency.
Multiple lawsuits were filed by victim families against the transit agency, the sheriff’s office, and Allied Universal, a private security company contracted to protect VTA facilities; the plaintiffs received an $8 million settlement in November 2022. More recently, a former bus driver objected to his firing for unexcused absences by claiming his post-traumatic stress disorder was worsened by the shooting.
Anyone with information about the shooting can contact the sheriff’s office at 408-808-4500 or the sheriff’s anonymous tip line at 408-808-4431.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
Staff writer Kristin J. Bender contributed to this report.
