A man opened fire with a handgun at a church service in a Wisconsin hotel on Saturday, killing seven people and wounding four before taking his own life, police said.

Four victims and the gunman died at the scene and three others died later at a hospital.

What prompted the violence at the Sheraton Hotel in Brookfield, 16 kilometers west of Milwaukee, during a regular service of the Living Church of God in a meeting room was still under investigation, Brookfield's police chief, Dan Tushaus, told reporters.

He said the unidentified 45-year-old shooter "was either a member or somehow affiliated with the church" and that he entered the service while in session and began firing.

A woman present in the room said "I sat in front of a family that he mowed down... I dove under a chair. The man whose chair I dove under, he died," the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.

The newspaper said one of those killed was the group's minister. Police were searching the man's residence in a nearby town.

"I have no indication of a motive at this time," Tushaus told a news conference. He said the church had been meeting at the same location for the past four to five years.

The police chief did not release the names of the victims but said the four slain at the scene were two teenaged boys, aged 15 and 17, a 72-year-old man and a woman aged 55.

Of the seven wounded people taken to hospitals, three later died men aged 44, 50 and 58. Still being treated and in serious condition were a 52-year-old man, a 20-year-old woman, a 20-year-old man and a 10-year-old girl.

The denomination, headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, believes that the Sabbath the day of worship is to be observed on Saturday. According to its website it is active in North and South America, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia with over 200 congregations. The church is an offshoot of the Worldwide Church of God founded by American evangelist Herbert W. Armstrong in 1933.

The hotel is located near a major shopping center. Several other gatherings were taking place there on Saturday, but no injuries were reported outside the meeting room.

(China Daily March 14, 2005)