Officer among 10 killed in Boulder market attack
BOULDER, Colo. — A gunman opened fire in a Boulder supermarket Monday, killing 10 people including a police officer who was the first to respond to the scene, authorities said.
Police arrested the suspect, but did not reveal his name at an evening news conference where police Chief Maris Herold fought back tears. And no motive was immediately disclosed for the shooting at the King Soopers store in Boulder, about 25 miles northwest of Denver and home to the University of Colorado.
“This is a tragedy and a nightmare for Boulder County,” said District Attorney Michael Dougherty. “These were people going about their day, doing their shopping. I promise the victims and the people of the state of Colorado that we will secure justice.”
The attack was the seventh mass killing this year in the U.S., following the March 16 shooting that left eight people dead at three Atlantaarea massage businesses, according to a database compiled by the Associated Press, USA Today and Northeastern University.
It follows a lull in mass killings during the pandemic in 2020, which had the smallest number of such attacks in more than a decade, according to the database, which tracks mass killings, defined as four or more dead, not including the shooter.
The slain officer was identified as Eric Talley, 51, who had been with Boulder police since 2010, Herold said. He went to the store after a call about shots fired and someone carrying a rifle.
“He was by all accounts one of the outstanding officers of the Boulder Police Department, and his life was cut too short,” Dougherty said.
Identities of the nine other victims were not disclosed Monday night as police were still notifying their family members.
Matthew Kirsch, the acting U.S. attorney for Colorado, pledged that “the full weight of federal law enforcement” will support the investigation. He said investigators from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were at the crime scene, along with FBI agents.
Officers had escorted a shirtless man with blood running down his leg out of the store in handcuffs but authorities would not say if he was the suspect. They said the suspect was receiving medical care.
Dean Schiller told the Associated Press that he had just left the supermarket when he heard gunshots and saw three people lying face down, two in the parking lot and one near the doorway. He said he “couldn’t tell if they were breathing.”
Video posted on YouTube showed one person on the floor inside the store and two more outside on the ground. What sounds like two gunshots are also heard at the beginning of the video.
Law enforcement vehicles and officers massed outside the store, including SWAT squads, and at least three helicopters landed on the roof. Some windows at the front of the store were broken.
At one point, authorities said over a loudspeaker that the building was surrounded and that “you need to surrender.”
Sarah Moonshadow told the Denver Post that two shots rang out just after she and her son, Nicolas Edwards, finished shopping. She said she told her son to get down and then “we just ran.” Once they got outside, she said they saw a body in the parking lot.
James Bentz told the Post that he was in the meat section when he heard what he thought was a misfire, then a series of pops.
“I was then at the front of a stampede,” he said.
Bentz said he jumped off a loading dock out back to escape and that younger people were helping older people off of it.
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis tweeted a statement that his “heart is breaking as we watch this unspeakable event unfold in our Boulder community.”