Witnesses tackled gunman who killed 2 at Las Vegas grocery store

LAS VEGAS — A gunman shot and killed two people inside a busy south Las Vegas grocery store Tuesday morning before several witnesses tackled and subdued him until officers arrived.

The Metropolitan Police Department said the shooting was reported just before 11:30 a.m. and that a gunman was taken to a local hospital with injuries that were not life-threatening.

The victims, a man and a woman, were pronounced dead at the scene, police said.

At an afternoon news conference near the Smith’s grocery store at 9750 South Maryland Parkway, Metro Lt. Robert Price said it’s believed the gunman was in a previous relationship with the woman, and that the gunman and the woman had been in a child custody battle. The gunman and the victims were believed to be in their 40s, Price said.

Hanna Manker, of Las Vegas, was inside a Smith’s with her two children, ages 1 and 3, when gunfire rang out.

“My kids and I went to get some groceries,” Manker said. “Their dad ended up showing up to help us, thank God.”

Manker said she had gathered her groceries and was checking out when she heard multiple gunshots. The children’s father, Darius Alston, was also present.

“Checking out and we heard about five or six shots,” Manker said. “Everybody started running. I didn’t know what to do so I ducked down with my kids, and he made us run out.”

Manker said they briefly went back in the store to try to get their groceries, her keys and phone.

“Apparently we were closer than we expected to be” to the shooting, she said. “There was someone right on the other side of where we were checking out.”

She said she and her family go to the store often.

Asked her reaction, she said “traumatized.”

“I don’t know if I will ever be able to go into a store shopping again, honestly,” she said.

Manker described Alston as a hero, saying he helped apprehend the shooter. She said Alston relayed to police the details of the apprehension.

“Their dad actually is the hometown hero today,” she said. “He got the shooter.”

Patrol cars with sirens blaring continued to roll into the Silverado Ranch Place shopping center parking lot at noon.

Metro officers also cordoned off sections of the lot, including a nearby KFC, where witnesses to the shooting were interviewed.

By 1:30 p.m., most people had left the restaurant, some wearing hats and shirts with the Smith’s logo.

One man wearing a red hoodie and apron cried as other Smith’s employees surrounded and comforted him.

Paula Milton, of Las Vegas, said she was shopping inside the store at the time of the shooting.

“There was a volley of shots — like eight shots,” she said. “All of the sudden you just heard bang, bang, bang, bang. It was like eight shots. It was coming from the other side of the store, over by produce.”

Milton said people started screaming.

Milton said she used to work for Smith’s, so she “instantly started herding people out this door, getting people out of the store” as she pointed to a door on the north side of the property.

“We were all gathering around the corner trying to be out of the way,” she said.

She said as she was escorting people out of the store when she saw the gunman.

“I saw him walking out of the store, out the other door,” Milton said, pointing to doors on the south side of the Smith’s. “I was trying to get people shoved in a corner so we weren’t attracting him if he came down the sidewalk towards us.”

Milton said the man carried a handgun and what she described as an automatic rifle in his backpack.

“He was, just, nothing,” Milton said. “Just calmly walking. No expression.”

“As he was coming down the sidewalk towards where we were somebody was coming behind him and was yelling, ‘That’s him! That’s him!’”

The gunman started to walk around the corner of the store, near the pharmacy.

“One gentleman ran up and grabbed him,” she said. “Trying to get him. He tried to pull the gun on that guy.”

Another person then ran up and tried to help the first person apprehend the gunman.

“Between the two of them they knocked the gun out of his hand,” Milton said. “Got him down on the ground. Then, after they got him down on the ground, they wrestled the backpack off him and held him down until the cops came, which only took a few minutes.”

Milton took note of the demeanor of the gunman.

“He walked out of the store,” she said. “He was completely calm. No expression. No nothing. You could tell it was him because everyone else was running and screaming, and he was like no big deal … no big deal walking down the sidewalk.”

“Even after the person yelled ‘That’s him, that’s him,’ he didn’t even try to run or anything,” she said. “He just kept calmly walking. And that’s when the dude come up and started trying to wrestle him to get the gun from him. Pulled the gun and the other guy tried to, came in, and between the two of them they got the gun from him.”

A Smith’s spokesperson said in an email the company was cooperating with Metro and that the store would remain closed while police investigate. A timetable for reopening was not given. Smith’s added it was referring further questions to police.

“We are deeply saddened by this senseless act of violence,” Tina Murray, division head of communications and public affairs at Smith’s Food and Drug, said in the email. “The entire Smith’s family is offering our thoughts, prayers and support to our associates and customers.”

The Vegas Strong Resiliency & Justice Center, which is run by Clark County and opened in the aftermath of the Oct. 1, 2017, mass shooting at the Route 91 Harvest music festival, would open to assist those impacted by Tuesday’s shooting, a county spokesperson said in an email Tuesday afternoon.

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