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http://www.buzzfeed.com/davidmack/heres-what-we-know-about-the-virginia-tv-shooter

His LinkedIn account states that he began his career as a news intern in 1993, before working as a reporter and production assistant at various stations in the 1990s.

Between March 1999 and March 2000, he worked at WTWC-TV NBC 40 in Tallahassee, Florida.

In March of 2000, after losing his job, Flanagan filed a civil lawsuit in federal court against WTWC-TV for alleged racial discrimination. In the complaint, Flanagan said members of the station’s management called him “monkey,” suggested he had only been hired because of affirmative action, and asked him to “stop talking ebonics.”

The lawsuit was settled in January 2001 under unspecified terms.

Flanagan also said the station fired him after he threatened to contact the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to complain about the alleged discrimination, and asked for $15,000 in damages. The station’s general manager said an EEOC complaint was filed.

A spokesperson with the EEOC told BuzzFeed News the office could not confirm or deny that Flanagan had ever filed a report, due to Title VII confidentiality provisions.

“He had some conflicts with some people in the studio and in the control room,” San Diego 6 News Director Don Shafer, who was Flanagan’s former WTWC boss at the time of the suit, told BuzzFeed News.

Shafer said that Flanagan had a number of conflicts with people in the studio and in the control room, which eventually resulted in his firing. “But they were certainly nothing like pulling a gun on anyone or anything,” he said, adding that the conflicts were never race related.

“I wasn’t surprised that he sued us,” Shafer said. “He was just looking to get something out of being terminated, but there was nothing to his claims.”
“He was a pretty good reporter though,” Shafter said. “Good enough that I made him a weekend evening anchor.”

Greg Sextro, a TV producer who worked with Flanagan in Florida and stayed in touch with him for a few years, remembered him as a “goofy,” “nice guy” who was constantly reprimanded by superiors for the quality of his reporting.
“He was not a good reporter,” Sextro told BuzzFeed News. “They would take his writing and rip it up.”

Sextro also said he never witnessed any racial discrimination against Flanagan.
“He made that crap up,” Sextro said of Flanagan’s claims that his bosses called him racial slurs.

Other people who worked with Flanagan in Florida echoed Sextro’s statements.

“He seemed like a fairly nice guy when we hired him,” Kevin Christopher, who worked as the main anchor for the station, told BuzzFeed News. “He was a nice-looking young man, and he was fairly well-spoken. But he was not the greatest employee in the world. He just wasn’t getting the work done, and he always thought it was someone else’s fault.”

Christopher also said Flanagan was fired from WTWC-TV because of his poor performance, and that his discrimination lawsuit was “frivolous and without merit.”