Worker Killed in Shooting at Municipal Building in the Poconos

A township employee was shot to death Tuesday morning inside a municipal building in the Poconos region of northeastern Pennsylvania, according to state police.

Mike Tripus, 65, was found dead inside the building after state police responded to a report of gunfire inside the Paradise Township municipal building on Paradise Valley Road, police said.

The suspect was identified as David Green, 72, of Swiftwater, according to police. He was arrested at the building and taken into custody.

No motive was immediately given. Police are investigating the shooting as a homicide.

Paradise is about 100 north of Philadelphia. Tripus lived in Stroudsburg.

He was building code official and sewer enforcement officer for Paradise, according to the township's phone directory.

Detectives searched through Green's home on Sugarbush Road for evidence. Neighbors told NBC10 he had just moved to the home over the summer.

"Shock. Disbelief. Sadness. Just tragic," Green's neighbor, Bobbi Snyder, said.

Snyder described Green as a kind and generous neighbor.

"He came for dinner several times," she said. "When it snowed he had a new snow blower and he came and blew the snow off our driveway for us. Always friendly."

Snyder said Green had been working on his home for months and she believed he was having trouble obtaining permits from the township.

"I know there's been difficulties with getting permits for anybody that's trying to build anything in here," she said. "It's been very hard to do that with the township."

Paradise Township is about 20 miles north of Ross Township, where a gunman opened fire at a Board of Supervisors' meeting in 2013, killing three.

Noah Sullivan