An American who worked for a US defense contractor was shot and killed on Tuesday in the Saudi capital, the second deadly shooting of a Westerner in the kingdom in three days.
An unknown assailant killed the man in his home, said a spokesman for Vinnell Corp, based in Fairfax, Virginia. "He was found by another employee at his apartment and taken to a hospital, but did not survive," said the spokesman, Jay McCaffrey.
The victim was identified as Robert Jacobs, 62, of Murphysboro, Illinois, a seven-year employee of Vinnell, a subsidiary of Northrop Grumman Corp, said Northrop spokeswoman Janis Lamar.
Seven Vinnell employees were among the 35 people, including nine suicide bombers, who died last year in an attack on a Riyadh foreigners' housing compound.
Vinnell, which has several dozen Americans in the kingdom training Saudi security forces, maintains a secure residential compound for its employees, but the victim chose not to live there, McCaffrey said.
The official Saudi news agency said police were investigating the death. Saudi security officials declined immediate comment.
"I am shocked," said Bandar Al-Ajmi, 29, a Saudi who lived round the corner from the victim. "He was our neighbor, and neither God nor the Prophet [Muhammad] would accept that something like this would happen."
An orange police bus blocked the street leading to the apartment in a villa in the Khaleej neighborhood of eastern Riyadh.
The British Foreign Office has advised Britons against all nonessential travel to Saudi Arabia. The US has gone further, urging all its citizens to leave the kingdom.
Militant attacks have surged in the past two months, despite a high-profile campaign against terrorists the government began after last year's suicide bombings.
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