Manhattan Office Shooting Witness Accounts

In Manhattan, office cleaner Sebije Nelovic recounts her experience during a tragic shooting incident involving Shane Devon Tamura, who allegedly opened fire inside a luxury office building, killing several individuals.

Authorities have identified Tamura as the suspect in the shootings that claimed the lives of four people, including members of a police department outside New York. Nelovic reported hearing what sounded like “firecrackers” while she was working and described the glass door at the reception area on the 33rd floor “shaking.”

“It started to fall—boom. And this guy came in the middle of the door and pointed his gun at me,” Nelovic stated.

She said Tamura fired around her and ordered her to raise her hands. “I’m a cleaning lady,” she remembers saying, realizing, “he has a machine gun… he’s going to shoot no matter what.”

In a moment of desperation, Nelovic managed to escape and hide in a nearby closet. “I started praying,” she reflected, adding that she could hear people screaming in the hallway.

She recounted that Tamura shot at the closet door as he walked by, and then her thoughts drifted to Julia Hyman, a 27-year-old associate at Rubin Management, knowing she was working late that night. “I knew she was at her desk, and I, God, helped her,” Nelovic prayed for Hyman while concealed.

Hyman was reportedly shot after leaving a safe room, which led to further panic.

Nelovic mentioned that her supervisor had reached out to her via text and call, urging her to stay hidden. In fear that her phone might give away her location, she moved it. “I sat in my closet for two, maybe three hours,” she recalled.

It wasn’t until she returned home to Queens and turned on the news that she learned about Hyman’s tragic death. “Thank God, I’m fine,” Nelovic stated, adding that she has worked in that building for 27 years.