lone gunman
An individual person who acts on his or her own initiative, without partners, especially one who has sole responsibility for doing something questionable, confidential, or iniquitous.
Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
“The police suspect a lone gunman committed the crime.”
“He plays the lone gunman role at work by making every decision himself.”
“Investigators initially searched for a group of suspects, but evidence soon suggested the act was the work of a lone gunman.”
“The manager acted as a lone gunman when he fired the staff without consulting the rest of the board members.”
“I do not want to be a lone gunman in this project because I need a team to share the responsibility.”
“Historians continue to debate whether the tragic event was a coordinated conspiracy or the isolated action of a lone gunman acting entirely on his own accord.”
From the Warren Commission's lone gunman theory, that the assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy was the work of a single individual, subsequently applied to numerous other political assassinations and shootings.
Last updated August 10, 2026