Police praised as US reels from massacres

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HERO police stopped a killer gunman slaughtering hundreds more with a high-powered rifle.

They managed to shoot dead Connor Betts within one minute of him starting his rampage, killing nine and injuring 27 others.

Betts, 24, opened fire outside a bar Dayton, Ohio, yesterday.

The outrage came just hours after 21-year-old Patrick Crusius is alleged to have slaughtered 20 people at a packed Walmart in El Paso, Texas, on Saturday afternoon.

Crusius had posted an anti-Mexican manifesto before the AK47 attack, which also injured 26 people.

He is now in custody with authorities considering a charge of capital murder, which would carry the death penalty if convicted.

In Ohio just 13 hours later, Betts started shooting outside Ned Peppers bar with a .223-calibre rifle.

Mayor Nan Whaley said: “If the Dayton police had not gotten to the shooter in under a minute, hundreds of people in the Oregon district would be dead today.”

Police confirmed Betts’s 22-year-old sister Megan was among the dead, along with her boyfriend.

Investigators are probing whether the attackers were fuelled by Donald Trump’s “racist” rhetoric.

The US President branded the Texas attack “an act of cowardice”. And UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said yesterday: “Our hearts go out to all those affected.”

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ANTI-gun celebrities have been accused of hypocrisy after attending a lavish party thrown by the owner of one of the world’s biggest weapons producers.

A-list stars including supermodel Naomi Campbell, below, Dame Joan Collins and actor Hugh Grant attended the 90th birthday of Gaston Glock last Friday.

■ The billionaire inventor of the Glock pistol held the party in the foothills of the Austrian Alps.

But many of those at the bash have previously spoken out about gun violence.

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Model Naomi’s attendance came just weeks after she wrote on Twitter about the horrors of gun crime. in