Posted on 02/13/2007 4:34:26 PM PST by wagglebee
The 18-year-old gunman who killed five people in a crowded Utah shopping mall was a Bosnian Muslim refugee who was prepared to kill many more, say investigators.
An off-duty police officer having an early Valentine's Day dinner with his wife was credited today with cornering Sulejmen Talovic, exchanging fire with him until other officers arrived to shoot and kill the gunman.
The trench-coated teenager wanted to "to kill a large number of people" and probably would have killed many more if not for the off-duty officer, Police Chief Chris Burbank said.
A friend said Talovic was from the war-torn country of Bosnia and that the trauma he experienced while growing may have led to him snapping for some reason.
Ken Hammond, an off-duty officer from Ogden, north of Salt Lake City, jumped up from his seat at a restaurant after hearing gunfire and cornered the gunman, exchanging fire with him until other officers arrived, Burbank said.
"There is no question that his quick actions saved the lives of numerous other people," the police chief said.
Police said it was not immediately clear who fired the shot that killed Talovic.
Talovic had a backpack full of ammunition, a shotgun and a .38-caliber pistol, police said. Investigators knew little about Talovic, except than he lived in Salt Lake City with his mother, the chief said. He was enrolled in numerous city schools before withdrawing in 2004, the school district said. Initially, police refused to release his name or any information about his background.
Talovic drove to the Trolley Square shopping center – a century-old former trolley barn with winding hallways, brick floors and wrought-iron balconies, and immediately killed two people, followed by a third victim as he came through a door, Burbank said. Five other people were then shot in a gift shop, he said.
Four people who were wounded remained hospitalized today, two in critical condition, two in serious.
Outside the mall, candles and flowers were left as memorials to the victims.
Hammond's boss, Ogden Police Chief Jon Greiner, said the state Senate wants to honor him.
"Thank goodness he was there," said Greiner, who is also a state senator. "You don't want to ever say it's good we were there and killed somebody, but it's probably good someone was there."
Accountant Jeff Barlow was on a date at a restaurant when he looked outside and saw the gunman firing from the hip.
"I thought it was some kind of joke – some kind of movie or stunt," Barlow said. "I didn't believe it was happening. And then I saw a man go down in a courtyard. I realized this was serious. These are real bullets flying around."
David Dean, who owns a greeting-card store at the mall, said three or four people died inside his store, which was packed with Valentine's Day shoppers.
Considering the press suppressed such news in the Tampa Teen kamikaze case and the DC sniper duo case, and here...
No, no Muslim mention, but here is a more detailed version of events, minus the shooter's name:
Gunman Kills 5 in Utah Shopping Mall
Armed with shotgun and handgun, teenage shooter fired indiscriminately at mall customers
By JENNIFER DOBNER
Associated Press Writer
Updated: February 13th, 2007 10:34 AM EDT
A shopping mall's winding hallways became a shooting gallery for a gunman in a trench coat who fired a shotgun randomly at customers, killing five and wounding four before being killed by police, authorities and witnesses said.
The shooter, whose name was not released, also was armed with a handgun and had several rounds of ammunition, Salt Lake City police Detective Robin Snyder said early Tuesday. No motive has yet been determined, she said.
For hours after Monday evening's rampage at the Trolley Square mall, police searched stores for scared, shocked shoppers and employees who were hunkered down awaiting a safe escort.
Marie Smith, 23, a manager at the Bath & Body Works store, saw the gunman through the window. She watched as he raised his gun and fired at a young woman approaching him from behind.
"His expression stayed totally calm. He didn't seem upset, or like he was on a rampage," said Smith, who crawled to safety in an employee restroom to hide with others. She said the gunman looked like "an average Joe."
Killed were two 28-year-old women, a 52-year-old man, a 24-year-old man and a 15-year-old girl, Snyder said. Four people were hospitalized - a man and a woman in critical condition and two men in serious condition, Snyder said.
Matt Lund was visiting his wife, Barbara, manager of the Secret Garden children's clothing store, when he heard the first shots. The couple and three others hid in a storage room for about 40 minutes, isolated but still able to hear the violence.
"We heard them say, 'Police! Drop your weapon!' Then we heard shotgun fire. Then there was a barrage of gunfire," said Lund, 44. "It was hard to believe."
They said officers treated everyone like suspects - ordering those hiding in storerooms, bathrooms or under stairwells, to lie on the floor with their hands on their heads until police were sure no one posed a threat.
On the way out, Lund said, he saw a woman's body face-down at a shop entrance and a man's body on the floor in the mall's east-west corridor. "There were a lot of blown out store windows and shot gun shell casings all over the floor," Lund said. "It was quite surreal."
The victims were found throughout the 239,000-square-foot (about 22,20 square meter) shopping mall.
Outside, streets were blocked as police swarmed the four-block scene. Dozens of people lingered on the sidewalk, many wrapped in blankets, as they talked about what they had seen inside.
The two-story mall, southeast of downtown, is a refurbished trolley barn built in 1908, with a series of winding hallways, brick floors, wrought-iron balconies and about 80 stores, including high-end retailers such as Williams-Sonoma and restaurants such as the Hard Rock Cafe.
Antique store owner Barrett Dodds, 29, said he saw a man in a trench coat exchanging gunfire with a police officer outside a card store. The gunman, he said, was backed into a children's clothing store.
"I saw the shooter go down," said Dodds, who watched from the second floor.
Four police officers - one an off-duty officer from Ogden and three Salt Lake City officers - were involved in the shootout with the gunman, Snyder said. She provided no other details.
Barb McKeown, 60, was in another antique shop when two frantic women ran in and reported gunshots.
"Then we heard shot after shot after shot - loud, loud, loud," said McKeown, saying she heard about 20. She and three other people hid under a staircase until it was safe to leave.
____
The article says that the shooter had a traumatic early life. The trauma that made him do this was not in his early life, it was in the Muslim community where he grew up.
And I miss you.
Kissy.
And the SUV attack in Chapel Hill, NC.
I'll bet that most freepers knew immediately this was a Muslim, didn't we? They are killing machines inculcated with the Cult of Death. That's what they do. Why is anyone surprised?
ping
There are a number of incidents over the past few years with Muslim perps that have been just brushed off. Is there any FReeper that is compiling a list? There seems to be a larger trend developing.....
True, but when you see a first name like "Suleyman", you can bet the ranch that the guy isn't Irish!
Don;t get off track or sucked into assuming anything about anyone.
Perhaps they had just deliberately stolen from him using lawyers and corporate shenanigins. Perhaps he faces losing his home or could not care for his family because of their actions.. in any case his actions were not the random murder of people but a specific murder. That is not terrorism.
That is not what the Islamofacist did. He targeted no one but simply murdered people at random.
We need to not let our opponents muddy the water..
We were just attacked by a Muslim period.. Islamofacist Leaders have threated the US with attacks and now we have had several all of which have been portrayed as simple crimes including this one.
Call it what it is, an act of terorism.
W
Utah does have a right to carry law. Check out packing.org for a list of states that do and do not and a brief summary of the laws for each. Remember this happened in Salt Lake City, not exactly a rural setting.
So now snapping means that he did what he was trained to do since birth, but he just didn't wait for authorization?
Bad terrorist, no virgins.
Lol....and, it was even funnier the second time.
I heard NOTHING about this on the news....NOTHING!
Another good reason to deport ever lat MF'ing mudslime to the ME, tear down every mosque in the uS brick by brick, and salt the ground it was built on!
Look at France! It's happening here.NOW!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.