Mass shooting leaves 14 dead in California; 2 suspects killed, identified

San Bernardino, California: Police on Wednesday identified the two suspects, a man and a woman, who died in an exchange of fire with police following the mass shooting that killed 14 people in California.

San Bernardino Police Chief Jarrod Burguan said police no longer believed a third suspect was at large: "We're pretty comfortable that the two shooters that went into the building are the two shooters deceased on San Bernardino Avenue."

"The first one is Syed, Rizwan, last name Farook. He is 28 years old. I am told that he is US-born," Burguan told a news conference. "The person that was with him is a female. Her name is Tashfeen, last name Malik. She is 27 years old."

Burguan said Farook was a county employee who has worked for five years as an environmental specialist in the public health department.

The heavily armed shooters targeted a year-end party taking place at a social services building in San Bernardino, about an hour's drive east of Los Angeles.

Police have been investigating reports the shooting might be linked to a disgruntled employee who left the party following a dispute.

Burguan confirmed that Farook was present at the event.

"He did leave the party early under some circumstances that were described as angry or something of that nature."

But the police chief said he did not believe this was a crime committed in the heat of the moment.

"Based upon what we have seen and based upon how they were equipped, there had to be some degree of planning that went into this," he said.

"So I don't think that he just ran home, put on these types of tactical clothes, grabbed guns and came back on a spur of the moment thing."

San Bernardino, California: Two suspects died in a gun battle with police Wednesday hours after authorities say they burst into a holiday party at a centre for people with developmental disabilities and killed 14 people.

It was unclear whether the furious shootout with the suspects -- a man and a woman -- was the end of a daylong manhunt after the mass shooting at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino.

After the shooting at Inland Regional Center, authorities generated a lead that turned up a name. Detectives followed up on it at the home in Redlands.

While there, a black SUV with Utah plates passed by slowly then sped up and raced off. A police car looking for the suspect vehicle spotted the SUV and took up pursuit. There was a shootout.

The male suspect shot from the vehicle while the woman drove.

It continued a quarter of a mile then stopped as an officer returned fire. The driver, a woman, was hit.

It was the deadliest such incident in this town - on the desert's edge an hour east of Los Angeles.

San Bernardino is prey to regular gang violence, but the California desert town has never seen carnage of the scale that left 14 dead on what had been just another Wednesday morning.

Paul George, a youth center leader, was around the block when the shooting erupted inside a packed conference room at the Inland Regional Center for the disabled.

"I was at the gas station and I heard gun shots. Over a dozen. The police started to pull out from everywhere locking down the perimeter."

The 28-year-old, who has spent most of his life in San Bernardino, was not frightened at first.

"I'm used to hearing gun shots," said George. "There's gang violence everywhere here, day and night."

But this soon turned out to be violence on a different level entirely.

Wednesday's attack was the country's worst mass shooting since 2012 when 20 pupils and six adults were killed at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut by 20-year-old Adam Lanza.

"I've been with the county police for 26 years I've never seen anything like that," police spokeswoman Cindy Bachman told AFP, a few hundred meters from the crime scene.

Television footage of the entrance to the Inland Center showed wounded people laid out on the sidewalk, their clothes slit open on the spot to allow medics to tend to their injuries.

Some of the wounded, visibly shocked, were carried away on stretchers, while others were transported by hand - sometimes loaded into the back of a pick-up truck while waiting for an ambulance.

Several people lost their shoes in the panic.

Olivia Navarro, 63, received the first call at 11:00 am from her daughter Jamille, a case manager at the hulking facility that provides services to disabled people across the region.

"She said there are shooters in the building, we're gonna go in a room, lock the door and turn off the light," Navarro said.

She headed straight to the site, beside a highway junction on the edge of an industrial area, where she spent a terrified hour waiting outside the police cordon for news.

"It was one hour until I learnt my daughter was OK," she said. A text message finally arrived, letting her know her daughter was among those evacuated to safety at a nearby golf course.

"I'll be able to hug my daughter tonight but I feel so sorry for the families who lost their loved ones," Navarro said, her voice breaking.

Beside her, two women were holding hands and praying out loud, while people evacuated from the center were loaded onto a bus, their faces pale, many on their telephones.

Hours after the shooting that left 14 dead and 17 injured, dozens of police cars still cordoned off a huge area around the Inland Center, but also a few miles away in Loma Linda, where a shootout erupted as police tracked down three suspects - two of whom were killed. Another person was detained.

"Step back, there could be something going on from here," warned officers wearing bullet-proof vests and helmets, toting machine guns as helicopters roared overhead.

The Republican Senator Jeff Stone, observing the scene near the Inland Center, wondered out aloud about the shooters' motives.

"The three suspects seemed well organized," he said. "Is it domestic terrorism? International terrorism like in France?"

Asked whether tougher gun control was the way to stem America's plague of mass shootings, he was not convinced.

"The Constitution guarantees the right to bear arms," he said. "If you prevent everyone to get them, it seems to be only the criminals who get the guns."

The violence began around 11 a.m. at the convention building at the Inland Regional Center where employees with the county health department were attending a holiday event. Witnesses said at least two shooters opened fire, killing 14 people.

Another 17 people were hurt -- many wounded by bullets from automatic-style rifles, some injured in the panic to escape.

The shooters fled in a black SUV, prompting a huge police response in the area.

As the hours passed, the hunt for the suspects continued with a tip taking officers to a home about 10 miles away in Redlands. A vehicle similar in description to the suspect SUV pulled out and a chase began.