One type of rifle, one trail of sorrow
Police say Nikolas Cruz used an AR-15 rifle in the Parkland, Fla., mass shooting. The civilian version of the military’s M16 and M4 rifles fires a high-powered .223-caliber round and usually has a 30-round magazine. The semi-automatic AR-15 has similar qualities to many hunting rifles but has a military appearance, including a collapsible stock. It’s popular among sport shooters for its accuracy and its versatile, easily customized frame. AR-15 variants have been used in a series of mass killings:
JUNE 20, 2012:
James Eagan Holmes,
24, used an AR-15-style
Smith & Wesson rifle with a 100-round drum magazine, a 12-gauge Remington shotgun and two .40-caliber Glock semiautomatic pistols to kill 12 and injure 58 at a movie theater in Aurora, Colo.
DEC. 14, 2012:
Adam Lanza, 20, used an AR-15-style Bushmaster to kill 27 people — his mother, 20 students and six teachers — in Newtown, Conn., before killing himself.
DEC. 2, 2015:
Syed Rizwyan Farook and Tashfeen Malik, 28 and 27, used two AR-15-style Remington rifles and two 9mm handguns to kill 14 and injure 21 at Farook's workplace in San Bernardino, Calif., before they were killed.
JUNE 12, 2016:
Omar Mateen, 29, used an AR-15-style Sig Sauer MCX and a 9mm Glock semiautomatic pistol to kill 49 people and injure 58 at an Orlando, Fla., nightclub before he was killed.
OCT. 1, 2017:
Stephen Paddock, 64, used a variety of rifles, including an AR-15, to kill 58 people and injure hundreds at a music festival in Las Vegas before he killed himself.
NOV. 5, 2017:
Devin Kelley, 26, used an AR-15-style Ruger to kill 26 people at a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, before he was killed.