Terror at Blackstone: The Herrowing Hours at 345 Park Avenue | Company Business News

(Bloomberg)-The alarm reached Jon Gray on the 44th floor, in his C-suite office high above Park Avenue: An active shooter was in the building. In the foyer below, an armed man caught fire and killed a uniform police officer and two others who worked in the office tower. Then the shooter shot at the turning cage, got on a lift and walked up. Gray, billionaire president of Blackstone Inc., saw his phone lift again and again and again, while security warnings flashed and he tried to process calls from co -workers to process what was going on for the next few hours. Employees hid in bathroom stalls and utility boxes, and stacked up couches, desks and feces in doors. Photos of the temporary barriers quickly spread on social media, illustrating the chaos that overwhelmed the normally quiet office environment. “Brutal,” Gray remembers less than 24 hours later, tearing in an interview. What unfolded in Park Avenue 345, in the heart of Midtown Manhattan, on Monday, quickly adopted sober dimensions: It now stands as the worst mass shooting in New York in a quarter century. The four people who were killed – a police officer guarding the foyer, an upcoming star at Blackstone, a private security guard and a collaborator at a real estate management company – appear to come from all hiking trails in New York Life. Even when office workers past the scene is jackets in the oppressive July heat on Tuesday, the American flag outside at Halfmast, the glass near the entrance of the building, was the city’s collective shock tangible. Founded in 1985, Blackstone has grown from a small partnership to one of the world’s largest asset managers. This has been through periods of growth and unrest, including the global financial crisis of 2008 and the Coronavirus pandemic. But in a note to employees Tuesday, Gray and CEO Steve Schwarzman called the worst day in the history of the firm ‘. One of Blackstone’s brightest stars, Wesley Lepatner, was one of the dead, shot in the foyer because she was about to meet a colleague for a drink. Like mourning family members and friends of the three other victims, Blackstone employees are still trying to start at 18:30 and for many people did not end hours later. At the peak of the evening storm, a man parked his BMW on Park Avenue, quietly thrown over a public square with a gun in the assault style in his hand, stepped into the foyer and set fire. Glass broke in the foyer and bodies lay still. Office workers jumped out of the building or crashed around the cover. (Police said the armed man, identified as Shane Tamura of Las Vegas, was looking for the headquarters of the NFL Professional Football League, which is located in the same building; Tamura ends at Rudin management on the 33rd floor where he began to spread to a self-inflicted gun. Waldorf-Bastoria Hotel, the new, located, located, located. Headquarters of JPMorgan Chase & Co. and the Grand Boulevard of the Beaux Arts Grand Central Terminal. Other firms, including consulting firm KPMG and the landlord Rudin, also call the building home. Few still knew if someone had been injured or killed. Many Blackstone employees were still at their desks and started calling colleagues and texting to find out what was going on. One heard the initial fire of the firearm of the armed man and colleagues immediately spoke via Microsoft teams to cover. It saved many lives, said one Blackstone employee. By 7pm, half an hour after Tamura first entered the foyer, police officers had some employees out of the 345 park shepherd, workers said. One employee remembered that he was on a zoom call and opened the door to discover colleagues with their hands over their heads and several police officers with guns. Police struggled the group in the elevator and to safety. Floor for the floor they were led to the July night and left their names and phone numbers for the police to write on paper. Some were too delayed to initially leave their hiding places. Others would only leave at about 10pm, as police continue to sweep every floor. About 11pm, when Blackstone’s offices were fully clarified, several learned that Lepatner had died. Gray was one of the managers who went to Bellevue Hospital to provide support to Lepatner’s family. “The focus is now the loss of Wesley and the handling of the trauma people experienced last night,” Gray said. Only the day was Gray in Blackstone’s Monday meetings with her. Late Tuesday morning, Gray and Schwarzman Blackstone employees around the world addressed via Zoom. The message: Everyone is sore and it is normal after such loss. Schwarzman asked employees to support each other. Blackstone is reviewing its safety, and many employees have praised how their bosses handled the tragedy. Rudin has already strengthened security in response to crime in the area, and then Unitedhealthcare CEO, which stationed more guards. Many employees expect a stricter security in the future. Blackstone’s offices will remain closed this week, and it is unclear when it opens again. It all happened so fast, many of them said. Several added that they were perhaps just as easy among those who did not make it home. -with help from David Scheer. More stories like these are available on Bloomberg.com © 2025 Bloomberg LP