American shot dead in Saudi Arabia

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — An American citizen was shot and killed Tuesday in Saudi Arabia, a U.S. Embassy official said, the second deadly shooting of a Westerner in the kingdom in three days.

"We can confirm that an American has been killed in Riyadh," a U.S. Embassy official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. He provided no further details.

Police responding to a report of a shooting found the American shot to death in his home, the official Saudi news agency said. The death was under investigation, it said.

The victim worked for Vinnell Corp., a U.S. defense contractor based in Fairfax, Va., the official said. Seven Vinnell employees were among the 35 people, including nine suicide bombers, who died last year in an attack on a Riyadh foreigners' housing compound.

Vinnell spokesman Jay McCaffrey said the company had not been able to reach the next of kin for the victim, who was found by a fellow employee who had come to his apartment.

Vinnell, which has several dozen Americans in the kingdom training Saudi security forces, maintains a secure residential compound for its employees, but the victim chose not to live there, McCaffrey said.

On Tuesday evening, an orange police bus blocked the street leading to the home in the Khaleej neighborhood of eastern Riyadh. Bandar Al-Ajmi, a 29-year-old Saudi living around the corner, said he had often seen the victim in the neighborhood.

"I am shocked," Al-Ajmi said. "He was our neighbor, and neither God nor the prophet would accept that something like this would happen. I am saddened."

Saudi security officials would not immediately comment.

Besides training security forces, Vinnell Corp., a subsidiary of Northrop Grumman Corp., also provides other services ranging from construction to supply and transportation work. Last year, it was awarded a $48 million contract to train the new Iraqi army.

Saudi officials have blamed a string of attacks on Westerners, government targets and economic interests in the kingdom on militants inspired by or belonging to al-Qaida, the anti-Western terror network led by Saudi-born Osama bin Laden.

An Irish cameraman and a British reporter for the British Broadcasting Corp. came under fire Sunday while filming a militant's family home in Riyadh. The cameraman, Simon Cumbers, 36, was killed and BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner, 42, was critically injured.