At least eight people, including children, have been killed and several others injured after a gunman opened fire in the parking lot of a Texas mall on Saturday, with the shooter now gunned down by the police, authorities said. The shooting happened at the Allen Premium Outlets in Allen, a small suburb north of Dallas - and saw at least nine injured and several, including children, dead.
Several people have been transported to the hospital. Chilling photos and videos from the scene show bodies lying on the street. According to a source, there was a search for a second shooter, but police now say they think the shooter acted alone.
Sudden Attack Leaves Multiple Dead
At least nine people were rushed to multiple trauma centers in Allen, Texas, but police chief Brian Harvey stated they "do not have an accurate count" of the fatalities and injuries. He added that more patients might have been transported to hospitals privately.
According to the Washington Post, Rep. Keith Self (R-Texas) there eight people were killed and seven were seriously wounded in the massacre.
According to CNN, Medical City Health Care in Dallas handled eight shooting victims, whose ages ranged from 5 to 61.
Authorities in Allen, Texas, responded to the afternoon shooting at Allen Premium Outlets, prompting shoppers and workers to take shelter. The rampage started after a gunman got out of his car and opened fire in the parking lot, immediately injuring multiple people.
A video from above the scene of the shooting shows hundreds of consumers leaving the area, with many of them with their hands raised. Aerial footage from the scene appeared to show at least three victims covered in sheets outside the mall.
Around 6 o'clock, police were seen searching stores after arriving at the complex more than two hours earlier in response to reports of the shooting.
Footage circulating online captures the exact moment the gunman opens fire, with the shooter pulling up in a car to the site where the dead victims were later found and opening fire randomly.
Gunman Killed But Not Identified
The Allen Police Department stated in a statement that one of its officers subdued the gunman while responding to an unrelated incident just after 3:30 p.m., four and a half hours after police were first called to the mall.
An officer who was at the mall responding to an unrelated call heard the shots, ran toward the sound, and "engaged and neutralized the threat," Harvey told reporters.
The attacker was "shooting his gun everywhere," one witness said.
A graphic video circulating on social media appears to show the body of the alleged shooter who was shot during the event. The suspected shooter is seen lying in a pool of his own blood while wearing heavy military tactical gear outside of a Fatburger restaurant in the mall.
The background shows several parked police cars from the Allen Police Department.
In the video, several people can be overheard nonchalantly discussing the shooter's body while still holding onto their shopping bags.
The video shows an assault rifle lying on the ground behind the man, who is clothed entirely in black.
"We believe he acted alone and we don't believe there's another threat at this time," the chief said.
"As I was holding the door open and letting customers inside the store... he [the shooter] was just blazing and shooting his gun," one unidentified witness told CNN, adding the assailant was walking down the sidewalk "shooting his gun everywhere."
The shooter wore a vest and "looked like he was trained ... he knew what he wanted to do," a mall worker whose manager saw the gunman told CNN.
Several shots went off before "a lot of people started running straight to our door trying to come in," the employee said, adding, "our manager he went out, just when he was opening the door people kept trying to come in, I guess he saw the person with a vest and everything, had a gun, it looked like an AK."
A source claims that police believe they have located the deceased suspect's car, which the bomb squad was checking out as a precaution.
The mass shooting in Allen is the most recent in a long line of gun attacks across the country that have terrorized stores, hospitals, schools, and other locations that are otherwise belived to be safe.
The shooting comes just days after a shooter allegedly opened fire with a handgun inside a hospital in Atlanta, killing at least one person and injuring four others before being apprehended hours later.
According to the Gun Violence Archive, there have been at least 199 mass shootings with four or more victims in the US this year, excluding the shooter.
