US police after the shooting
Usa: massacre at the Mall in Texas, 8 dead plus the killer
Nine dead, including the killer, three injured in critical condition and four in stable condition: this is the toll of yet another massacre, this time taking place in a shopping center in Allen, a suburb forty kilometers from Dallas, Texas. The alarm was triggered around 3.30 pm, when a man arrived by car and parked near the entrance to the mall, near the M&M store. The killer, dressed in black combat uniform, wearing a bulletproof vest, came out carrying a weapon of waran Ar-15 type rifle, and started shooting at people who were walking a few meters away from him. Five, including a child, were killed immediately, a sixth not far away.
The killer walked along the sidewalk and shot anyone nearby. Ten were injured, including two who later died in hospital. At that moment there were thousands of people in the Mall, families, women, boys, engaged couples, children. The massacre could have been even more serious if an agent had not intervened, who had been called to the shopping center for another reason. The policeman confronted the killer and killed him, hitting him at least once in the left eye. The killer’s body remained lying in front of a hamburger and sandwich store. The man, dressed in black, had the semi-automatic rifle with an inserted 45-round magazine beside him. This massacre, compared to the more recent ones, has offered a series of chilling documents that have shown the key moments of the massacre. In a clip, recorded by the camera installed on the car of a person who has just left the mall, we see the arrival of the killer’s car, the man getting out and starting shooting at the crowd as in an execution. Images aren’t sharp, but the flurry of shots is clearly audible.
Another video shows people fleeing as a dozen powerful explosions are heard in quick succession. A third video, shot on a mobile phone by a person who approached the bodies of the victims, showed people devastated by the blows, covered in blood. For hours, the video was clicked on Twitter, without the platform censoring it. Among the bodies at the entrance to the Mall was a boy or girl, arms outstretched, blood on the back of the neck. According to investigators, the killer, whose name has not yet been provided, fired between 60 and 70 shots. The massacre once again raises the theme of the spread of weapons.
The governor, the Republican Greg Abbott, spoke of “inexplicable tragedy”, but since 2014 the number of victims due to weapons has grown vertically, along with the increase in weapons in circulation. Nine years ago, according to data provided by the Center for Disease Control, there were 2,468 victims. The following year there were 3,203, and the trend continued to rise systematically: 3,353 deaths in 2016, then 3,513 in 2017, 3,522 in 2018, 3,683 in 2019.
If California has the record for guns sold, Texas is in second place, but surpasses it for the percentage of victims: 67 percent higher than the West Coast state. An intervention from the White House is expected in the next few hours. With each massacre, US President Joe Biden makes the same appeal to the Republicans in Congress: immediately approve a law banning weapons of war. As always, it will not be heard. The gun lobby in America is very strong and finances politicians in Washington, especially those of the Republican Party.
Conservatives, as always, are already “sending prayers” to the families of the victims. To reporters who asked if praying was not enough to stop the massacres, the Republican representative of Texas, Keith Self replied: “Those who criticize do not believe in an omnipotent God, who is instead in control of our lives”. Trumpian Marjorie Taylor Greene is on the same line: “We don’t need more gun control – she commented – but to entrust ourselves to God”.
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