Charles Lee "Cookie" Thornton entered a Kirkwood, Missouri City Council meeting on February 7, 2008, and shot and killed two council members, a police officer, and the Kirkwood Public Works Director. He also shot the Mayor of Kirkwood, Mike Swoboda, twice in the head, and an additional police officer outside of the Kirkwood City Hall. Police responding to the scene shot and killed Thorton.

A graduate of Kirkwood High School, Thornton opened a contracting business in the 1990s, and in 1995, Thornton filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy protection. Beginning in 2001, Thornton began to be cited for violations of a host of city ordinances, and was arrested that year for assaulting Kirkwood's Public Works Director Kenneth Yost. In 2006, Thornton was arrested for twice disrupting city council meetings and by 2007 had been banned from speaking at them.

On the night of February 7, Thornton shot and killed officer William Biggs outside Kirkwood City Hall with a .44 Magnum revolver. Thornton then entered a just-convened council meeting and immediately shot police officer Tom Ballman in the head from point blank range. Thirty people were at the meeting at the time of the shooting, and witnesses report that Thornton repeatedly uttered the phrase "Shoot the Mayor!" as he shot and killed council members Connie Karr and Michael H.T. Lynch, and Public Works Director Kenneth Yost. He also shot Kirkwood Mayor Mike Swoboda twice in the head, although Swoboda survived. Thornton was later killed by police responding to the scene. In the aftermath, Gerald Thornton claimed that his brother had gone "to war" with the government.