DynaChem President and CEO Keith Rife sustained non-life threatening injuries after being shot in the head and hip by a long-time employee during a Dec. 26 performance review, according to local reports.
The employee, identified as chemist Wayne Woodson, 65, then killed himself with the handgun he had pulled from his briefcase. He was pronounced dead that the scene according to the Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette. Woodson was DynaChem's director of new technologies and had been with the company for more than 20 years.
The a small, privately held industrial chemical maker based in Georgetown, Ill., about 30 miles from Champaign, produces a bio-based material for thermoset resin developer Cara Plastics Inc. of Newark, Del. Cara targets the closed-mold market for high-performance parts and large structures, such as Cara-designed hurricane-resistant roofs. The soy-based product is suitable for resin transfer molding, vacuum-assisted RTM and compounds for sheet molding and bulk molding with many different reinforcement fibers, from carbon to feathers. DynaChem also makes a wide variety of epoxy, furan and phenolic resins.
Urbana's Carle Foundation Hospital, where the News-Gazette reported Rife was taken via ambulance and later interviewed by Vermilion County sheriff's office investigators would not comment on Rife's condition, or even confirm that he is a patient there.