A US lawmaker admitted to being the source of an erroneous report of gunfire in a Congress office building that led authorities to shut down a large part of the legislature's sprawling complex for several hours. Republican Representative Jim Saxton, speaking to Fox television, said he was in the elevator at the garage level of the Rayburn House Office building, when he heard what he thought was gunfire.
"I heard what I thought to be between six and ten shots," the Republican lawmaker said.
"It sounded exactly like gunfire to me. It was not of a backfire nature. it was the sharp crack as comes out of a weapon."
He continued: "I dove back into the elevator, rushed back to my office and asked my chief of staff to report what I had seen or heard to the Capitol Hill Police, which she did, and that started the chain of events that unfolded over the course of the day."
The report prompted police to lock down the Capitol dome building and Rayburn for more than five hours, while they searched in vain for a gunman, trapping lawmakers, visitor and office workers in the congressional complex.
