Daily News (Los Angeles)

6 dead in mall stabbings; suspect killed

- By Rick Rycroft

A man stabbed six people to death at a busy Sydney shopping center Saturday before he was fatally shot, police said, with hundreds fleeing the chaotic scene, many weeping as they carried their children. Eight people, including a 9-month-old, were injured.

New South Wales police said they believed a 40-yearold man was responsibl­e for the Saturday afternoon attack at the Westfield Shopping Centre in Bondi Junction, in the city's eastern suburbs and not far from the world-famous Bondi

Beach. They said they were not able to name him until a formal identifica­tion had taken place but that they weren't treating the attack as terrorism-related.

The man was shot dead by a police inspector after he turned and raised a knife, New South Wales Assistant Police Commission­er Anthony Cooke told reporters.

“This all happened very, very quickly — the officer that was in the vicinity attended on her own, was guided to the location of the offender by people who were in the center,” he said. “She took the actions that she did saving a range of people's lives.”

The attack at the shopping center, one of the country's busiest and that was a hub of activity on a particular­ly warm fall afternoon, began around 3:10 p.m. and police were swiftly called.

“They just said run, run, run — someone's been stabbed,” one witness told ABC TV in Australia. “(The attacker) was walking really calmly like he was having an ice cream in a park. And then he went up the escalators ... and probably within about a minute we heard three gunshots.”

Six of the victims — five women and a man — and the suspect died. The officer conducted CPR on the attacker until the arrival of paramedics, who also worked on the man.

New South Wales Police Commission­er Karen Webb said the eight injured people were being treated at hospitals. The baby was in surgery, but it was too early to know the condition, she said.

“We are confident that there is no ongoing risk, and we are dealing with one person who is now deceased,” Webb said in a later briefing. “It's not a terrorism incident.”

Witnesses were shocked at the rare outburst of violence. Australia enacted strict gun laws after a man killed 35 and wounded 23 in 1996 in Tasmania.

“I saw all the people running and I didn't know what was happening,” said Ayush Singh. “I thought it was some people playing a prank or something and after some time I saw a guy with a knife running from the footpath to the cafe where I work.”

He said police arrived quickly and told everyone to stay put.

Singh said he saw the man running just meters (yards) away as he wielded a knife. “I didn't hear him say anything,” he added. “Just a random guy stabbing people. Mad guy.”

Video footage shared online appears to show a man confrontin­g the attacker on an escalator in the shopping center by holding what appeared to be a post toward him.

As the attack unfolded, panicked individual­s streamed out of the shopping center, many with children in their arms. Paramedics treated injured people at the scene. The shopping center and the surroundin­g area remains in lockdown as police piece together what went on.

“This was a horrific act of violence indiscrimi­nately targeted at innocent people going about a normal Saturday, doing their shopping,” said Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United States