Police: Shots fired at Canada mall, 1 dead
Jun 3, 2012, 1:30 AM
Associated Press
TORONTO (AP) – A gunman fired shots in a busy food court in one of Canada’s busiest malls Saturday killing one man and injuring eight, police said.
Toronto police constable Victor Kwong said two people were in critical condition. He said the person who was killed died at the scene. Some of the injuries came when people were trampled on and pushed. He said the suspect had not been apprehended.
Witnesses said multiple shots were fired in the food court in Toronto’s downtown Eaton Centre and that hundreds of panicked shoppers sprinted for the exits. The mall was evacuated.
Swarms of people watched from outside as an injured man with visible bullet wounds was wheeled out on a stretcher.
Toronto Blue Jays baseball player Brett Lawrie tweeted that he sprinted out of the mall after hearing the shots.
“People sprinting up the stairs right from where we just were … Wow wow wow,” Lawrie tweeted.
Marcus Neves-Polonio, 19, was working in the food court when he saw a man pull out a gun and start firing.
At least two people were on the ground, he said.
“All of a sudden a herd of people were just running toward us, a massive crowd of people screaming, running, freaking out,” said Hannah Stewart, 21, who was shopping in the mall at the time. “We saw this girl, sitting on the ground, and she had blood on her toes.”
That girl appeared to have been one of the victims and told Stewart she had just been shot.
Erica Solmes, who manages the McDonald’s in the mall’s food court, said she heard about 15 shots ring out before a stampede of people made a dash for the exits.
The Eaton Centre is a busy shopping area popular with tourists.
In 2005, a 15-year-old girl was killed during the Christmas holidays just north of the mall in a shooting that shocked the city during a year of record gun deaths in Toronto, Canada’s largest city.
(Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
