Three workers for a program that treats veterans for post-traumatic stress disorder and a gunman who held them hostage at a California home for veterans were found dead inside the room where he was holed up on Friday, bringing a tragic end to an all-day standoff with police at the facility, authorities said. A state senator whose district includes the area, Bill Dodd, earlier told reporters the gunman was a member of Pathway Home. The hostages were three women who had worked with him at the sprawling facility, he said. "This is a tragic piece of news, one that we were really hoping we wouldnt have to come before the public to give," he added. California Highway Patrol spokesman Chris Childs told reporters outside the facility in Yountville, a picturesque town located in the heart of Napa Valleys wine country about 60 miles (97 km) north of San Francisco. Despite repeated efforts by police negotiators to communicate with the suspect throughout the day, authorities said they had failed to make contact with the gunman after he exchanged gunfire with a sheriffs deputy at the outset. The incident began when the gunman calmly walked into the Pathway Home building carrying a rifle during a going-away party for one of the employees, according to Larry Kamer, the husband of one of the programs administrators. Kamer, who volunteers at the home and was acting as an unofficial spokesman for the facility, said his wife told him by telephone during the siege that the gunman had allowed her and three other women to leave the room where the party was taking place, while three female employees remained behind as hostages. The siege came less than a month after a former student with an assault-style rifle killed 17 people at a Florida high school. That massacre touched off a student-led drive for new restrictions on gun sales to curb mass shootings that have occurred with frightening frequency in the United States over the past few years.