Texas shooter targets church
UNITED STATES: A man dressed in black tactical-style gear and armed with an assault rifle opened fire inside a church in a small South Texas community yesterday, killing 26 people and wounding at least 16 others in what the governor called the deadliest mass shooting in the state’s history. The dead ranged in age from 5 to 72 years old.
Authorities didn’t identify the attacker during a news conference yesterday, but two other officials identified him as Devin Kelley.
A US official said Kelley lived in a San Antonio suburb and did not appear to be linked to organised terrorist groups. Investigators were looking at social media posts Kelley made in the days before the attack, including one that appeared to show an AR-15 semiautomatic weapon.
Kelley had faced court-martial and was discharged from the Air Force for allegedly assaulting his wife and child, according to an Air Force spokeswoman. The spokeswoman, Ann Stefanek, said that Kelley was sentenced to 12 months’ confinement after a 2012 courtmartial. He ultimately received a bad conduct discharge and reduction in rank. She said Kelley served in Logistics Readiness at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico from 2010 until his discharge.
At the news conference, the attacker was described only as a white man in his 20s who was wearing black tactical gear and a ballistic vest when he pulled into a petrol station across from the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs about 11.20am. The gunman crossed the street and started firing a Ruger AR rifle at the church, said Freeman Martin, a regional director of the Texas Department of Safety, then continued firing after entering the white wood-frame building, where an 11am service was scheduled.
As he left, he was confronted by an armed resident who chased him. A short time later, the suspect was found dead in his vehicle at the county line, Martin said. Several weapons were found inside the vehicle and Martin said it was unclear if the attacker died of a self-inflicted wound or if he was shot by the resident who confronted him.
He said investigators weren’t ready to discuss a possible motive for the attack.
He said 23 of the dead were found in the church, two were found outside and one died after being taken to a hospital.
Governor Greg Abbott called the attack the worst mass shooting in Texas history.
‘‘There are no words to describe the pure evil that we witnessed in Sutherland Springs today. Our hearts are heavy at the anguish in this small town, but in time of tragedy, we see the very best of Texas.’’
Among those killed was the church pastor’s 14-year-old daughter, Annabelle Pomeroy. Pastor Frank Pomeroy, and his wife, Sherri, were both out of town in two different states when the attack occurred, Sherri Pomeroy wrote in a text message.
‘‘We lost our 14-year-old daughter today and many friends,’' she wrote. ‘‘Neither of us has made it back into town yet to personally see the devastation. I am at the Charlotte airport trying to get home as soon as I can.’'
Federal law enforcement swarmed the small rural community of a few hundred residents 48 kilometres southeast of San Antonio after the attack, including ATF investigators and members of the FBI’s evidence collection team.
At least 16 wounded were taken to hospitals, hospital officials said, including eight taken by medical helicopter to the Brooke Army Medical Centre. Another eight victims were taken to Connally Memorial Medical Centre, located in Floresville about 16km from the church, including four who were later transferred to University Hospital in San Antonio for higher-level care, said spokeswoman Megan Posey. Alena Berlanga, a Floresville resident, said everyone knows everyone else in the sparsely populated county. ‘‘This is horrific for our tiny little tight-knit town,’' Berlanga said. ‘‘Everybody’s going to be affected and everybody knows someone who’s affected.’'
Regina Rodriguez, who arrived at the church a couple of hours after the shooting, walked up to the police barricade and hugged a person she was with. She said her father, 51-year-old Richard Rodriguez, attends the church every Sunday, and she hadn’t been able to reach him. She said she feared the worst.
Church member Nick Uhlig, 34, wasn’t at yesterday’s service, but said his cousins were at the church and that his family was told at least one of them, a woman with three children and pregnant with another, was among the dead.
The church has posted videos of its Sunday services on a YouTube channel, raising the possibility the shooting was captured on video.
President Donald Trump, who was in Japan as part of an Asian trip this week, called the shooting an ‘‘act of evil’' and said he was monitoring the situation.
‘‘We’re shocked. Shocked and dismayed,’' said state Senator Judith Zaffirini, a Laredo Democrat whose district includes Sutherland Springs, a rural community known for its peanut festival, which was held last month.
Later yesterday, two sheriff’s vans were parked outside the address listed for Kelley on the rural, western outskirts of New Braunfels, north of San Antonio, preventing a group of waiting journalists from entering.
Ryan Albers, 16, who lives across the road, said he heard intensifying gunfire coming from that direction in recent days. ‘‘At first I thought someone was blasting. It had to be coming from somewhere pretty close. It was definitely not just a shotgun or someone hunting. It was ... automatic weapon fire.’'