This is topic Man Opens Fire at Omaha Mall, Killing 8 in forum Off-Topic Post, Non Stock Talk at Allstocks.com's Bulletin Board.


To visit this topic, use this URL:
http://www.allstocks.com/stockmessageboard/ubb/ultimatebb.php/ubb/get_topic/f/14/t/003834.html

Posted by J_U_ICE on :
 
Dec 5, 10:16 PM (ET)

By OSKAR GARCIA


OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - A man opened fire with a rifle at a busy department store Wednesday, killing eight people in an attack that made holiday shoppers run screaming through a mall and barricade themselves in dressing rooms.

The young shooter, who left a note predicting, "Now I'll be famous," wounded five others, two critically, then took his own life.

Witnesses said the gunman sprayed fired down on shoppers from a third-floor balcony of the Von Maur store.

"My knees rocked. I didn't know what to do, so I just ran with everybody else," said Kevin Kleine, 29, who was shopping with her 4-year-old daughter at the Westroads Mall, in a prosperous neighborhood on the city's west side. She said she hid in a dressing room with four other shoppers and an employee.

The shooter - 20-year-old Robert A. Hawkins of Bellevue, according to friends and a law enforcement official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly about it - was found dead on the third floor with a self-inflicted gunshot wound, and his victims were discovered on the second and third floors, police said.

Sgt. Teresa Negron said the gunman killed eight people, then apparently killed himself. Authorities gave no motive for the attack and said they did not know whether he said anything during the rampage.

After his family kicked him out, Hawkins lived for a little more than a year with a friend's family in a house in a middle-class Bellevue neighborhood, said Debora Maruca-Kovac, a nurse who along with her husband took him in Hawkins, a friend of her sons.

"When he first came in the house, he was introverted, a troubled young man who was like a lost pound puppy that nobody wanted," Maruca-Kovac said.

Maruca-Kovac said Hawkins was fired from his job at a nearby McDonald's this week and had recently broken up with a girlfriend. She said he phoned her about 1 p.m. on Wednesday, telling her that he had left a note for her in his bedroom. She tried to get him to explain, but he hung up, she said.

She called Hawkins' mother, went to the Maruca-Kovacs' house, retrieved the suicide note - in which Hawkins wrote that he was "sorry for everything," would not be a burden on his family anymore and "now I'll be famous," she said - and took it to authorities.

Police received a 911 call from someone inside the mall, and shots could be heard in the background, Negron said. By the time officers arrived six minutes later, the shooting was over, she said.

"We sent every available officer in the city of Omaha," Negron said.

The Omaha World-Herald reported that the gunman had a military-style haircut and a black backpack, and wore a camouflage vest.

"Everybody was scared, and we didn't know what was going on," said Belene Esaw-Kagbara, 31, a Von Maur employee. "We didn't know what to do. I was praying that God protect us."

Mickey Vickory, who worked at Von Maur's third-floor service department, said she heard shots at about 1:50 p.m.

She and her co-workers and customers went into a back closet behind the wrapping room to hide, then emerged about a half-hour later when police shouted to come out with their hands up. As police took them to another part of the mall for safety, they saw the victims.

"We saw the bodies and we saw the blood," she said.

Keith Fidler, another Von Maur employee, said he heard a burst of five to six shots followed by 15 to 20 more rounds. Fidler said he huddled in the corner of the men's clothing department with about a dozen other employees until police yelled to get out of the store.

Witness Shawn Vidlak said the shots sounded like a nail gun. At first he thought it was noise from construction work at the mall.

"People started screaming about gunshots," Vidlak said. "I grabbed my wife and kids we got out of there as fast as we could."

Shortly after the shooting, which came three weeks before Christmas, a group of shoppers came out of the building with their hands raised. Some were still holding shopping bags.

Police told people to park their cars at businesses across from the mall and to wait for their loved ones, then directed them to an Omaha hotel to await information.

Nebraska Medical Center spokeswoman Andrea McMaster said it had three victims from the mall shooting, including a 61-year-old man in critical condition with a bullet wound to his chest.

Three victims were brought Creighton University Medical Center; two died and the other was critically wounded, spokeswoman Lisa Stites said.

By Wednesday evening, police were using a bomb robot to access a Jeep Cherokee left in the mall parking lot. Authorities believe the vehicle belonged to Hawkins. Officers had seen some wires under some clothing, but no bomb was found.

President Bush was in Omaha on Wednesday for a fundraiser, but left about an hour before the shooting.

"Having just visited with so many members of the community in Omaha today, the president is confident that they will pull together to comfort one another," White House press secretary Dana Perino said.

The Von Maur store is part of a 22-store Midwestern chain. The sprawling, three-level mall has more than 135 stores and restaurants. It gets 14.5 million visitors every year, according to its Web site.

It was the second mass shooting at a mall this year. In February, nine people were shot, five of them fatally, at Trolley Square mall in Salt Lake City. The gunman, 18-year-old Sulejman Talovic, was shot and killed by police.

---
 
Posted by turbokid on :
 
when that happened in my state earlier this year, applications for a concealed weapon permit went up something like 150% locally

what is making these kids do this?
i feel for all the folks just out trying to buy a gift for loved ones for christmas.
 
Posted by Propertymanager on :
 
If the law abiding citizens would all carry a concealed weapon, this nonsense wouldn't happen (or at least the shooter wouldn't live long enough to kill 8 people). A handgun makes a great Christmas gift!

Mike
 
Posted by Lockman on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Propertymanager:
If the law abiding citizens would all carry a concealed weapon, this nonsense wouldn't happen (or at least the shooter wouldn't live long enough to kill 8 people). A handgun makes a great Christmas gift!

Mike

I don't know, do we really want a mall full of gun toting customers? From what I read about this particular case it was over and done with in 6 minutes, most people had no idea what was going on. If all of a sudden 20 people pulled out their concealed weapons things could have really gotten out of hand.
I'd say this was handled as well as could have been expected.
 
Posted by Propertymanager on :
 
"If all of a sudden 20 people pulled out their concealed weapons things could have really gotten out of hand.
I'd say this was handled as well as could have been expected."

Out of hand more than 12 people shot and 8 people dead? I don't think so.

Mike
 
Posted by bdgee on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Propertymanager:
If the law abiding citizens would all carry a concealed weapon, this nonsense wouldn't happen (or at least the shooter wouldn't live long enough to kill 8 people). A handgun makes a great Christmas gift!

Mike

When you manage to get a statute to that effect, will it contain any provision to prevent those that like to refer to anyone not opting to eagerly accede to his or her political and social eccentricities from wandering about in public and challenging people with insults and bigoted pronouncements, thus threatening at any time to destroy any semblance of peace?

Or do you wish to be armed too?
 
Posted by Propertymanager on :
 
Of course, like many of your fellow responsible Texans, I am armed. When you deal with low income tenants that at any moment may decide to start taking crack or meth, you need to protect yourself.

Mike
 
Posted by Lockman on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Propertymanager:
"If all of a sudden 20 people pulled out their concealed weapons things could have really gotten out of hand.
I'd say this was handled as well as could have been expected."

Out of hand more than 12 people shot and 8 people dead? I don't think so.

Mike

If 20 people that don't know each other (and have no training in a situation such as a mall shooting,) pull out their guns who's to say who started the shooting.

Once a stray bullet from a well meaning gun toting customer or employee, finds the chest of another totally innocent customer do we charge that person with a crime?

Trained police officers make mistakes and shoot unarmed innocent bystanders, what are they suppose to do in a mall crowded with hundreds of people knowing 20% or more of them might be armed.

Having the general public armed to the teeth is not going to stop some mentally ill kid from shooting up a mall.

Having a concealed weapon should be limited to those who have a specific reason for one and have extensive training as to how to use it.

Someone randomly pulling out a gun, can and most certainly will cause panic in a crowd. Isolating the one person with a gun is how police and security personnel are taught to deal with such a problem. They don't need Joe consumer pulling out a gun and waving it around.
 
Posted by bdgee on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Propertymanager:
Of course, like many of your fellow responsible Texans, I am armed. When you deal with low income tenants that at any moment may decide to start taking crack or meth, you need to protect yourself.

Mike

That's scary!

As I said:

"... will it contain any provision to prevent those that like to refer to anyone not opting to eagerly accede to his or her political and social eccentricities from wandering about in public and challenging people with insults and bigoted pronouncements, thus threatening at any time to destroy any semblance of peace?

"Of course, like many of your fellow responsible Texans, I am armed."

But, for the most part, those are "responsible" people, not prone to an inability to refrain from uttering at least one or two bigoted insults with every breath and causing those insulted to want to respond to the degrading challenges.

That's scary!

I'm strongly a believer in the right stated in the 2nd, but you may convince me there must be consideration of some limitations.
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Propertymanager:
If the law abiding citizens would all carry a concealed weapon, this nonsense wouldn't happen (or at least the shooter wouldn't live long enough to kill 8 people). A handgun makes a great Christmas gift!

Mike

OK, if you send me a North American Arms .22 mag...
i'll have a matched set...
 
Posted by jordanreed on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Propertymanager:
Of course, like many of your fellow responsible Texans, I am armed. When you deal with low income tenants that at any moment may decide to start taking crack or meth, you need to protect yourself.

Mike

[Eek!]

a showdown between a slumlord and crackhead?..my guess is you would be... outnumbered,inexperienced,too slow on the draw,scared,wet-tween-the-legs,in over your head,a babbling idiot,crying,and then dead. [Smile]
 
Posted by Propertymanager on :
 
Jordan,

I provide clean and safe housing to low income tenants - definitely not a slumlord. However, I do buy cracker infested properties frequently and turn them around. I have dealt with dozens of crackheads (kicked them out to the street where they belong) and to a one they are wimpy losers. I am certainly not afraid of deadbeats and losers.

Mike
 
Posted by jordanreed on :
 
ya sure..
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
here's what's not funny IMO.


i have more firearms than all the GOP candidates combined... (that they would admit to anyway)...

i don't feel the need to carry them...

and when i have done things where they would be useful (like repo) i purposely left them home because i knew that it would change the way i approach the problems i was dealing with....

even when i do festivals and end up with a lot of cash, i don't want to be strapped
 
Posted by Lockman on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Propertymanager:
Of course, like many of your fellow responsible Texans, I am armed. When you deal with low income tenants that at any moment may decide to start taking crack or meth, you need to protect yourself.

Mike

I can understand your want to protect yourself,

I just hope you understand the responsiblity you've taken upon yourself once you started carrying a concealed weapon.

I take it your dealing with properties that house children and other unarmed people. They too have to deal with the drug addict in the area, what if they have armed themselves and mistake you as a threat. Is it just who is faster on the draw?

You would probably be better served to get to know your tenants and have them as a way to protect your back while your in the area. They know who's trouble and can alert you to a problem long before your gun has to come out it's holster.

Shooting an innocent child would be something you'd probably never get over.
 
Posted by bdgee on :
 
Or so he claims.

Just who do you imagine you are benefiting by "kick(ing) them out to the street where they belong"?

Isn't that just a lazy man's way of leaving the problem for someone else to have to deal with?

Crap, man, if you are all so capable and considerate as you want us to believe, why aren't you doing something to attack the problem instead of shouting nastiness about the people trapped in it and passing dealing with it on to the State to handle?
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
drug addicts belong in specialised hospitals..
however?
you cannot force treatment on them budg. they have to want it first, and there is no better place to figger that out than the gutter...
 
Posted by Lockman on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by glassman:
drug addicts belong in specialised hospitals..
however?
you cannoty force treatment on them budg. they have to want it first, and there is no better place to figger that out than the gutter...

That's true, but why is the gutter always in the same neighborhood? People find themselves in a situation of having no resources to get themselves out of poverty, having a drug addict waundering around doesn't make it any easier.
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
locking 'em up in jail isn't a cure tho..

it's actually Crime University.
 
Posted by IWISHIHAD on :
 
quote:
-------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by Propertymanager:

Jordan,

I provide clean and safe housing to low income tenants - definitely not a slumlord. However, I do buy cracker infested properties frequently and turn them around. I have dealt with dozens of crackheads (kicked them out to the street where they belong) and to a one they are wimpy losers. I am certainly not afraid of deadbeats and losers.

Mike
-------------------------------------------------

If you are not afraid of deadbeats and losers why are you carrying a gun?
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
your average "druggie" isn't living in the street:

Elaine Domino replays the scene over and over in her head: she falls off the ladder, and then her life falls apart.
Three and a half years ago, Domino, 52, was working on a display as a sales representative when she fell six feet off a ladder, cracked her head open and damaged discs in her back and neck.
The resulting pain threw Domino into a spiral of painkiller use and, later, abuse. Her drugs included Vicodin, Demerol and finally 20 OxyContin pills a day. After several failed attempts at kicking her addiction, Domino turned in desperation last summer to Dr. Cliff Bernstein, medical director of the Waismann Institute, which specializes in rapid opiate detoxification under anesthesia.


http://www.opiates.com/media/drugs-for-drugs.html

there are several new drugs out now that can block the pain of withdrawal... however, once withdrawal is complete? the PATIENT still has to cope with the loss of euphoria....
 
Posted by bdgee on :
 
I'm quite proud that my City's mayer is working hard toward a program to bring dignity to the lives of the homeless (not only here but in conjunction with people and organizions from cities around the Nation) so they may have reason to envision a life beyond despair.

People may have many reasons and excuses for homelessness, but a chance for a respectable future must be out there for any of them to believe there is a way out, whatever they may believe has them trapped in homelessness. Why try if the effort to get out can only yield derision and bias from predetermined little minds.
 
Posted by Propertymanager on :
 
"If you are not afraid of deadbeats and losers why are you carrying a gun?"

You're kidding, right?

"I'm quite proud that my City's mayer is working hard toward a program to bring dignity to the lives of the homeless"

There is no dignity to homlessness or being a drug addict. Many of these people are mentally ill and should be institutionalized for their own good. Those that are drunks, drug addicts, and lazy bums need to hit bottom so that they have a motive to change.

Instead of handouts, these people need help getting a JOB so that they can have the dignity of working and supporting themselves.

Mike
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
propman.

i had a friend who was a navy seal. (need i say more about what he's made of?)
he took his own life with a .357 cuz he couldn't beat the oxycodone, which he was prescribed by military doctors after an OTJ injury sustained during drug interdiction work somewhere south of here.
 
Posted by bdgee on :
 
Now, glass..., don't confuse his simple little arguments to justify bigotry,

It ain't fair using reality. You know that.
 
Posted by Propertymanager on :
 
glassman,

That's very sad. There's no doubt that some of these drugs are terrible and difficult to kick. I had a tenant who was a Vietnam veteran and a crack addict. I tried everything to help him, including driving him myself to the VA hospital to be admitted to an inpatient drug treatment program. He only stayed for half of the program and then came back and started hanging around with druggies. I ended up evicting him and he was (and may still be) homeless. I'm hoping that he'll hit bottom one day and get the help he desperately needs.

Mike
 
Posted by IWISHIHAD on :
 
Propertymanager, i guess you were kidding.

It appears by what you say you have a good reason to fear them, that is if you are not trying to pull everyone's leg by what you say.
 
Posted by T e x on :
 
chitter chattered...

I been shattered...all over Manhattan...don't mind the maggots, lol

'sup, fellas? what's the argument, here?
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
they're givin it away on 7th avenue Tex...

just discussing how to deal with mental illness..

to live in this town? you must be tough tough tough tough
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Propertymanager:
glassman,

That's very sad. There's no doubt that some of these drugs are terrible and difficult to kick.
Mike

which is stronger?

the Willow or the Oak
 
Posted by T e x on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by glassman:
they're givin it away on 7th avenue Tex...

just discussing how to deal with mental illness..

to live in this town? you must be tough tough tough tough

ahhh...

tough indeed--tough subject.

will say this: if they're snapping caps? that removes some "obligation" to weigh alternatives. If they're stumbling around, waving a blade? different story... snapping caps *accurately*? that's another, different story, altogether...

you catch my drift, I'm sure...

pretty early-on, "their" *mental history* is less a consideration than is public safety. Or my individual safety, for that matter...

Some wacko, hittin' up folks for Bible/Bhudda/spare change? Rave on...

Clearly, we have a breakdown re: unstable gaining access to serious weapons
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
the report is he stole it from his step-dad, who apparently had kicked him to the curb a couple years ago...

reports are it was an AK-47, and other reports are SKS...

apparently it was a semi-auto so it couldn't be a real AK-47..

however 2 15 round clips were reportedly used so it wasn't likely to be an SKS... the SKS deatachable mags aren't easy to operate...
must be a "civilian style" kalishnikov like a MAK90
 
Posted by T e x on :
 
I suppose--despite the "founding fathers"--if you're gonna obtain/maintain weapons, you need to demonstrate some degree of adequate security. In that light, I'm "guilty" myself...lost a very robust weapon earlier this year, which in hindsight could have been prevented with a modicum of security.

Of course, that kinda "lets off" the thief...another conundrum: peeps shouldn't be up in my crib, w/o my permission
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
speaking of mental illness?


Tex, have you checked in on BCIT tonight?

they filed and janice is dancing with glee ove rthere..
RS coming.. that girl jes plain enjoys spreading misery,
i wonder who broke her?
 
Posted by T e x on :
 
no, but thanks for the hedzup...

we've known a few contrarians, eh?
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
i messed up and wasted afew posts or i'd be over there getting TOS'ed for telling her to go pull wings offa flies [Big Grin]

they asked me to be a mod there last June and i turned 'em down... i guess i shoulda said yes huh?
 
Posted by T e x on :
 
lol... a man's gotta do...

If one accepted every such offer, well...you know the math
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
i don't usually like the mood over there anyway..
 
Posted by turbokid on :
 
from the pictures it looks like an AK or one of the replicas.
Glass, dont the real AK's have an auto and semi auto selection feature?
 
Posted by glassman on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by turbokid:
from the pictures it looks like an AK or one of the replicas.
Glass, dont the real AK's have an auto and semi auto selection feature?

yes... and if he had full? i bet he woulda used it.. the boy was sick....
 
Posted by turbokid on :
 
touché... salesman
 


© 1997 - 2021 Allstocks.com. All rights reserved.

Powered by Infopop Corporation
UBB.classic™ 6.7.2