Police identify Walmart manager as killer
Motive of gunman’s rampage unknown
A 31-year-old overnight manager at Walmart shot and killed six people at a store bustling with Thanksgiving holiday shoppers before turning the pistol on himself, authorities said Wednesday, in America’s second highprofile mass shooting in four days.
Four other people remained hospitalised in unknown condition following the Tuesday night rampage in
Chesapeake, Virginia, police chief Mark Solesky said.
The gunman is believed to have died of a “self-inflicted gunshot wound,” Mr Solesky told reporters, adding that the motive behind the country’s latest outburst of gun violence was not yet known.
City authorities identified the shooter as Chesapeake resident Andre Bing, saying he was armed with one handgun and multiple magazines. Walmart confirmed in a statement that Bing was an overnight team lead, employed with the company since 2010.
An employee named Briana Tyler — who survived the attack — earlier described scenes of terror as the store manager entered a staff break room, and opened fire.
“He wasn’t aiming at anybody specifically,” Ms Tyler told ABC’s Good Morning America programme. “He just literally started shooting throughout the entire break room and I watched multiple people just drop down to the floor, whether they were trying to duck for cover or they were hit.”
She said the gunman looked right at her and fired but missed by mere inches. “He didn’t say a word, he didn’t say anything at all,” Ms Tyler said.
The assault came two days before the quintessential American family holiday yesterday and on the heels of a weekend gun attack at an LGBTQ club in Colorado that killed five people.
And fewer than 10 days before this shooting in Chesapeake, Virginia, three students at the University of Virginia who played on its football team were killed Nov 13 by a classmate after a field trip.
President Joe Biden called the attack senseless and said “there are now even more tables across the country that will have empty seats this Thanksgiving.”
In the Walmart attack, emergency calls were first made just after 10pm local time on Tuesday while the store was still open. Chesapeake is about 150 miles (240 kilometres) southeast of the US capital Washington.
Officers entered the store a few minutes later, Mr Solesky said.
The shooter and two victims were found dead in the break room, while another body was found next to the front of the store, the city said. Three people taken to hospital with gunshot wounds later died.
The youngest of the victims was 16 years old, officials said.
In the store parking lot on Wednesday, a makeshift memorial of flowers and small white electric candles sat against a tree beneath crime scene tape. White, blue and golden balloons tied to a tree blew in the wind.
Susan Neal Matousek came by the memorial display to “pay my condolences,” she told AFP.
“I couldn’t imagine losing someone right before Thanksgiving,” the 57-yearold said.