Mall Killings in Omaha

[3113]

Any Nebraska residents?

OMAHA -- A suicidal 19-year-old who killed eight people at a mall packed with holiday shoppers had turned his gun on himself by the time police got to the scene, authorities said today. The first 911 call came at 1:43 p.m. Wednesday, Omaha Police Chief Tom Warren said at a City Hall news conference. By the time the first officers arrived at the mall six minutes later, Robert A. Hawkins had killed himself.

"It doesn't appear there was an opportunity for mall security or police officers to engage this shooter," Warren said. Hawkins apparently stole from his stepfather the AK-47 he used to kill two shoppers and six employees of the Von Maur department store. Five other people were injured, and two remained in critical condition.

"At first I thought somebody was hammering, and then I realized nobody could hammer that fast," Keith Fidler, a Von Maur employee, said Wednesday. He said he watched in horror as the gunman shot an employee standing a few feet away. The victim collapsed near an escalator, Fidler said. "It was quiet for a few seconds, and then I heard a burst of about 30 to 50 rounds."

The shooter left several suicide notes. In a Wednesday evening news conference, Warren declined to speculate on Hawkins' motives, saying, "When you have an incident of this nature, it may be impossible to come up with an explanation."

Police and sheriff's officers swarmed into the mall within minutes, tending to the wounded and ushering out dozens of panicked customers and employees who were hiding in bathrooms and dressing rooms. "Everybody was scared, and we didn't know what was going on," said Belene Esaw-Kagbara, 31, another Von Maur employee. "We didn't know what to do. I was praying that God protect us."

The slayings were a stark reminder that crowded American malls are potential targets for violence. In February, five people were slain at the Trolley Square Mall in Salt Lake City by a gunman who was then killed by police. Wednesday's death toll marked the worst shooting rampage in Nebraska since 1958, when teenager Charles Starkweather gunned down nine people during a two-day murder spree across the state.

Police said they found Hawkins' body less than an hour after the first 911 calls were received. An SKS semiautomatic rifle was recovered, Warren said. ABC News reported that officials said the weapon had two loaded magazines taped together -- a technique that enables a shooter to reload quickly.

The Omaha World-Herald reported that witnesses said the gunman had a close-cropped, military-style haircut, wore a camouflage vest and carried a black backpack. "The person we believe to be the shooter died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound," said Omaha police Sgt. Teresa Negron.

Sarpy County sheriff's officials said Hawkins had left a note, and several Omaha television stations reported that police had recovered at least three notes left with relatives and friends in the area. Deputies later searched a Bellevue residence where Hawkins had lived in recent months. Police also used a robotic device to search for explosives inside a green Jeep that officials believe Hawkins left in the mall's parking lot. The search did not turn up any explosives.

On Omaha television broadcasts, those who knew Hawkins said he was a troubled youth who dropped out of high school a year ago. He recently was fired from a job at a local McDonald's and had been taking medication for emotional problems, several friends said. "He was depressed the last couple months, but I never thought he'd do something that extreme," a friend, Shawn Saunders, told KETV.

When the first shots rang, the mall was crowded. Christmas music played on the Von Maur store's sound system. It was just past the lunch hour, a time when the mall's traffic typically thins out.

When Fidler, working on Von Maur's second floor, heard rapid-fire noises from the floor above, it took several seconds before he realized something was terribly wrong. "There were bursts and then it would get quiet and then you'd hear these shots again," Fidler said. "After the first bunch, it was unmistakably gunshots."

He said he heard a woman call out to a store employee approaching an escalator, asking him to call 911. The employee had no time to react. The gunman leaned over a third-floor railing and squeezed off several shots. The man crumpled to the ground. "He appeared to be shot in the head," Fidler said. Fidler crouched down for a few moments and when the gunshots trailed off, he and another woman maneuvered to the downed man. Fidler examined the man and realized he was not breathing.

 

[rgraham666]

What a sad, idiotic and evil thing that stupid scumbag did. Asshole.

The motive is pretty simple. The dumb bastard was making sure he'd never be forgotten, proving to himself and others that he wasn't powerless.

And did he have two guns? The report said he stole an AK47. It also says a SKS was found at the scene. These are two different weapons.

I wish reporters knew enough to tell the difference.

 

[R. Richard]

And did he have two guns? The report said he stole an AK47. It also says a SKS was found at the scene. These are two different weapons.

I wish reporters knew enough to tell the difference.

The inital reports were that the weapon was an SKS. Most likely it was an SKS, as the rate of fire of an AK-47 would likely have resulted in many more than nine casualties.

 

[slyc_willie]

The SKS is a cheap Chinese version of the AK. Not the same weapon, but they resemble one another to the untrained eye.

I heard he had a pistol as well, which was what he used to kill himself.

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

The weapon hardly matters. An old lever-action Winchester cowboy/deer rifle would be just as deadly. So would a single shot .410 shotgun in a crowd of unarmed holiday shoppers. In Japan the occassional evil-doer commits equivalent mayhem with a samurai sword.

One caveat to all these kinds of events: The downside of omnipresent, instant and sensation-pandering news sources is that they create a false impression that such events are far more commonplace than is really the case. The tragedy is heartrending, but the incidence of such things in a country of 300 million is vanishingly tiny. One just must keep these things in perspective; without making an effort to do so the tendency is to become unbalanced and disconnected from reality.

BTW, such events contribute virtually nothing to crime statistics - most murders are domestic disputes or "business" disputes related to the drug trade, and occur within certain subcultures not characteristic of the nation as a whole.

 

[rgraham666]

The SKS is a cheap Chinese version of the AK. Not the same weapon, but they resemble one another to the untrained eye.

I heard he had a pistol as well, which was what he used to kill himself.

Hmmm. Checked out Wikipedia. And according to it they are different weapons.

The SKS is a semi-automatic carbine fed from stripper clips.

The AK is a selective fire assault rifle.

Doesn't matter, really. All those people are dead and that looney toon is responsible for it. His stepfather ought to get a hoof in the nuts for not storing his weapons properly.

 

[Pure]

The weapon hardly matters. An old lever-action Winchester cowboy/deer rifle would be just as deadly. So would a single shot .410 shotgun in a crowd of unarmed holiday shoppers. In Japan the occassional evil-doer commits equivalent mayhem with a samurai sword.

nice obfuscation. rox implies we shouldn't really worry about increasing numbers of AK 47s and semi automatic assault rifles. their effect she says, is "equivalent" to a samurai sword. i think the army should be apprised of this, and advised to save money by furnishing such swords.

police chiefs and policemen worry.

 

[Pure]

background of Hawkins

http://www.ndtv.com/convergence/ndtv/story.aspx?id=NEWEN20070035190&ch=12/7/2007 11:23:00 AM

The young man who killed eight people and committed suicide in a shooting rampage at an Omaha department store spent four years in a series of treatment centers, group homes and foster care after threatening to kill his stepmother in 2002.

Finally, in August 2006, social workers, the courts and his father all agreed: It was time for Robert Hawkins to be released nine months before he turned 19 and would have been required to leave anyway.[...]


In May 2002, he [Hawkins] was sent to a treatment center in Missouri after threatening his stepmother. Four months later, a Nebraska court decided Hawkins' problems were serious enough that he should be under state supervision and made him a ward of the state.

[...]


Troubled man

Robert Hawkins went through a series of institutions in Nebraska as he progressed through the system: months at a treatment center and group home in Omaha in 2003; time in a foster care program and treatment center in 2004 and 2005; then a felony drug-possession charge later in 2005. Landry said the court records do not identify the drug.

The drug charge was eventually dropped, but he was jailed in 2006 for not performing community service as required.

On August 21, 2006, he was released from state custody.

Under state law, Landry said, wards are released when all sides parents, courts, social workers agree it is time for them to go. Once Hawkins was set free, he was entirely on his own. He was no longer under state supervision, and was not released into anyone's custody.

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

The weapon hardly matters. An old lever-action Winchester cowboy/deer rifle would be just as deadly. So would a single shot .410 shotgun in a crowd of unarmed holiday shoppers. In Japan the occassional evil-doer commits equivalent mayhem with a samurai sword.

nice obfuscation. rox implies we shouldn't really worry about increasing numbers of AK 47s and semi automatic assault rifles. their effect she says, is "equivalent" to a samurai sword. i think the army should be apprised of this, and advised to save money by furnishing such swords.

police chiefs and policemen worry.

Pure's new definitors of what liberties should or should not be infringed: Police and police chiefs. We might as well scrap the 5th amendment also in that case, and take big bites out of the first.

 

[Pure]

right on, rox.

the second amendment give me a RIGHT to my Carl Gustav 84 mm weapon: gonna get me one.

http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/thumb/4/4c/300px-Irish_army_carl_g.jpg

only tyrants and socialists worry about such things!


---

it might take out part of the local mall, but hey it's no different from a couple sticks of dynamite (every teen's right).

see also:

http://alinafood.tripod.com/id7.html

http://www.eme421.com/84mm.html

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

PURE

People are generally cured when they use up their insurance and Medicaid money. The correlation coefficient is about .99

 

[Pure]

jbj, i don't see what your comment relates to.

in any case, tonights CNN says AK 47.

by the way, jbj, do you have a problem wiht policemen and police chiefs?

do you think most of them are happy to infringe on basic rights?

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

PURE

My comment relates to your #8. Let me make the logical connection obvious.

I have a low opinion of courts and treatment programs. All judges care about is the completion certificate; all the treatment providers care about is your insurance and Medicaid benefits. When the benefits are exhausted you get tossed out of treatment with a cured certificate to give to the judge. When you turn 18 the child welfare system doesnt care if youre cured or not, youre gone.

 

[Pure]

thanks for clarifying, jbj.

i agree. the system tossed Hawkins out when convenient. the timing had nothing to do with his state of mind, his dangerous impulses. i assume he was angry at everyone, including himself.

it's much like paroling a known rapist or pedophile; the system wants NOT to be bothered with him for a brief while.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

PURE

It's two things, really. ONE: The Players like to think they did some good. TWO: The Players are conditioned to believe there is good in all of us.

 

[Pure]

on1) yes, bureaucrats and counsellors/workers/therapists; guards, corrections officers, executioners, parole officers; all of them, EVEN the worst, believe they do good. indeed Hitler thought that too, as do all 'hitmen' ("He must have done something; he had it coming.")


on 2). i quarrel with the wording, but not the essence.

there is *speck* of good in all of us. BUT in practice it may be entirely overlaid, even by age 12, with vicious impulses (long island lolita). as an adult example, Bundy worked the distress lines, for a while, counselling the suicidal.

those with histories of 'crimes against persons' should NOT be paroled early simply on the theory that the 'good' within them will rise to the top!

 

[R. Richard]

PURE

My comment relates to your #8. Let me make the logical connection obvious.

I have a low opinion of courts and treatment programs. All judges care about is the completion certificate; all the treatment providers care about is your insurance and Medicaid benefits. When the benefits are exhausted you get tossed out of treatment with a cured certificate to give to the judge. When you turn 18 the child welfare system doesnt care if youre cured or not, youre gone.

Local governments are a business. When the local government gets money from the feds, they will 'help the troubled.' When the income runs out, so does the help.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

RICHARD

Most of the time they dont wait for the money to run out. Clients get public resources last, and lose public resources first.