Gunman kills 20, wounds 42 in Thailand
KORAT, Thailand — A soldier armed with an assault rifle went on a shooting rampage at a military base and a shopping mall in this nation Saturday, killing at least 20 people, wounding 42 and posting video on Facebook Live, officials said.
The gunman’s lengthy standoff with authorities ended Sunday morning when a raid led to a flurry of gunfire that killed him more than 12 hours after he arrived in a stolen Humvee from the base, where he had shot and killed a superior officer.
Security camera footage from the mall showed a young man clad in camouflage walking past shops with a long gun. Reports from inside described frantic shoppers fleeing, hiding in food court kitchens and behind cash registers, holding their breath and silencing their phones.
“I was really terrified. At that moment, I could not think about anything,” said Kul Kaemthong, a mall cleaner who rushed into a room in the fourth-floor food court with about 40 other people to hide before emerging hours later. “When we heard a gunshot, everybody started running for our lives.”
The shooting and the lengthy siege running into Sunday morning have thrown this city and country into a panic with all the anxious, gut-wrenching confusion and sorrow that accompanies mass shootings in the U.S. and acts of terrorism all over the world.
Without a clear motive, with social media again used to spread images of bloodshed, Thailand is now confronting its own version of an emerging global threat: the combination of guns, technology and a killer with access to both who is determined to take the lives of the innocent in a public place once deemed safe.
Nothing so severe is common in Thailand, but in a country of 69 million people with more than 10 million guns, authorities have been concerned for years about gun violence. Thailand has one of the highest gun homicide rates in Asia, and the episode in Korat comes just a month after a gunman killed three people at a mall in the central Thai city of Lopburi.
The shooting in Korat, a commercial hub for agriculture in Thailand’s poorest region, stunned officials; one said the gunmen “went mad,” creating an extended horror that turned the busy seven-story shopping center into a labyrinth of fear. But the violence started 9 miles away, on the military base, around 3 p.m. local time.
Defense Ministry spokesman Lt. Gen. Kongcheep Tantravanich said a soldier named Sgt. Jakkrapanth Thomma “shot and killed his superior officer” at Suthampitak Army Base in Nakhon Ratchasima Province. “He also shot and injured military officers.”
He then stole a Humvee, shooting at random along his route before entering the mall with several firearms, including an automatic rifle.
A Facebook page believed to be connected to Thomma included comments and images suggesting a grudge involving money.
“Getting wealthy from cheating and taking advantage of others,” he said in a comment on the page. “Do they think they can take their money to use in hell?”
The page also showed an image of a young man Saturday wearing a helmet.
“I’m tired now,” he said at one point. “I can’t move my finger anymore.” The Facebook page was taken down soon after.
Facebook said the suspected gunman’s Facebook and Instagram accounts were both removed.
Facebook said it had identified a short, live video posted by the suspected gunman, but a spokeswoman, Sarah Pollack, said it had found no evidence that the violence itself was streamed on Facebook Live.
The company said it was still looking into when the gunman’s video was streamed, adding that it would move to block others from posting the video, as well as anyone posting videos that depict the violence itself or support the attack.
In Korat, the operation to apprehend the gunman and clear the mall stretched for more than 12 hours. Shortly after 8 p.m. local time, the police Crime Suppression Division declared the gunman a most-wanted person and urged the public to call in tips about him.
Anutin Charnvirakul, the public health minister, told reporters that 20 people had been killed and 31 injured. Four suffered serious injuries, he said, and were undergoing surgery early Sunday.
But the numbers could rise. At one point early Sunday, gunshots could be heard from inside the mall.
As the siege continued, the area around the mall was cordoned off amid fears that many hundreds of people were trapped inside. Video showed steady streams of people, many carrying small children, fleeing the mall with the help of police and soldiers.