Witnesses recount senseless Raleigh shooting
The teenager who gunned down seven people in Raleigh, North Carolina, killing five, shot an off-duty police officer “for no reason,” a 911 caller reported.
Officer Gabriel Jesús Torres, 29, was on his way to work in plainclothes when he was approached by suspected gunman Austin Thompson, 15, who was “wearing all camo,” and carrying a long gun in a residential neighborhood, the caller told authorities, according to The News & Observer.
“He looks like he’s like 15,” the caller reportedly said. “He just walked right through and shot him. Shot him for no reason.”
The unnamed man told the dispatcher Torres was his “buddy,” and was bleeding from his chest after being shot while inside a white car in a residential neighborhood, according to the report.
“It’s an officer,” the man reportedly said in the 5:12 p.m. call. “He works for you all.”
At the same time, a second 911 caller reported gunshots and told authorities her neighbor was lying on the ground after being shot. Two minutes into the call she noticed another victim, the outlet reported.
“There’s two people,” the caller reportedly said. “There’s somebody laying by the bush, and there’s somebody laying on the porch.”
“We heard the shots, and we heard them screaming. And so we got down because we heard it was a gun. And when it stopped we got up and looked out our window.”
Witnesses described the Thursday shooting terror, which began in Raleigh’s Hedingham neighborhood and continued on a walking trail, to a local TV station.
“He had to be between 13 and 16 max,” a witness who saw the rampage told WRAL-TV. “He was a child. You just don’t imagine things like that. You hear about school shootings and stuff, but to really see something like that in your neighborhood is just …,” the shaken neighbor said, before trailing off.
“I heard two gunshots, and they were really loud so I knew something was close by, and then I heard three other gunshots,” another witness reportedly said. “I saw him basically pass my house in the backyard. He had a long-barrel shotgun. He was dressed in camo. He had a full backpack on that was also camouflage.”
The five people killed in the rampage were identified as Torres; Nicole Conners, 52; Mary Marshall, 35; Susan Karnatz, 49; and James Thompson, 16.
Thompson is the older brother of the suspect, who was tracked down by police more than four hours after the shooting.
Austin Thompson was taken into custody after a standoff with police in a barn six miles away from his house and had suffered a gunshot wound to his head, the local station reported. It was unclear if the wound was self-inflicted.
If Thompson survives, he will be tried as an adult due to the severity of the crime, prosecutors said.
Another victim, Marcille Gardner, 59, remained in critical condition Saturday and K-9 Officer Casey Clark was treated and released from the hospital.
A motive in the massacre had not been established, police said.
A shocked classmate of the suspect said Thompson was a personable teen who was considering joining the track team.
“I did not expect it to be him,” high school sophomore Omer Rosas said. “He was very calm. He wasn’t like a mean person. He was open to be nice to everyone.”
A neighbor of the teen suspect said he often displayed unusual behavior early in the morning before school.
“I used to see him at 4:30, 5 in the morning with a bookbag on,” Lavarius Thompson told The News & Observer. “Buses don’t run till 7 in the morning.” Thompson is unrelated to the suspect, the paper said.
The 25th fatal mass killing in the US so far in 2022 prompted President Joe Biden to condemn gun violence.
“Enough. We’ve grieved and prayed with too many families who have had to bear the terrible burden of these mass shootings,” he said.
“No neighborhood, no parent, no child, no grandparent, no one should feel this fear in their communities — no one,” North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper said, as he ordered flags in the state to be set at half mast.
With Post wires
