Las Vegas police officers race to the scene of a shooting in Las Vegas on Sunday. (Eric Verduzco / AP)
JOHN M. GLIONNA, MATT PEARCE
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Two Las Vegas officers ambushed, killed at lunch
Las Vegas police: 'This is a revolution,' shooters said during attack on officers
As many as five people were dead Sunday afternoon after police said a pair of people shot two police officers at a Las Vegas pizzeria and then stormed a nearby Wal-Mart, where they killed another victim in the store, then themselves.
“This is a revolution,” the suspects said during the attack, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Assistant Sheriff Kevin C. McMahill told reporters.
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There were conflicting reports about the gender of the two suspects – whether it was a man and a woman or two men – but officials said the attack apparently began at Cici’s Pizza on North Nellis Boulevard.
Two people walked into the pizzeria and shot both police officers in the head before taking their guns and ammunition and heading for the Wal-Mart, McMahill said.
Alize Harper, 16, was selling newspapers outside the Wal-Mart when she saw a car drive up, and a man start yelling for everyone to get out and warning that the police were coming.
Monse Galindo, 19, a customer in the store, was near the registers when she saw a tall, thin, middle-aged white man in military-style clothing walk in with a small gun in his hand.
@derekgrrrrr What exactly is hypocritical about your NRA statement? I don't think it means what you think it means. Coincidence is a better word here.
There were conflicting reports about the gender of the two suspects – whether it was a man and a woman or two men – but officials said the attack apparently began at Cici’s Pizza on North Nellis Boulevard.
Two people walked into the pizzeria and shot both police officers in the head before taking their guns and ammunition and heading for the Wal-Mart, McMahill said.
Alize Harper, 16, was selling newspapers outside the Wal-Mart when she saw a car drive up, and a man start yelling for everyone to get out and warning that the police were coming.
Monse Galindo, 19, a customer in the store, was near the registers when she saw a tall, thin, middle-aged white man in military-style clothing walk in with a small gun in his hand.
@derekgrrrrr What exactly is hypocritical about your NRA statement? I don't think it means what you think it means. Coincidence is a better word here.
DDOG83229
AT 4:38 PM JUNE 08, 2014
“He came in, shouting, ‘The revolution is about to start,’ something about a war, and that the cops were on their way,” Galindo told the Los Angeles Times, adding that the man then fired one shot in the air and another shot as he moved toward the left side of the store.
Galindo and Harper said the man appeared to be by himself, though police initially said there were two suspects in the store.
Karl Catarata, 16, was shopping with his mother and brother inside and also were near the registers when they heard the shouting, though the people shouting were just out of eyesight, he said.
“We thought they were shouting because there was a dispute, an argument,” Catarata said, but as he watched the body language of the Wal-Mart employees, who could see what was going on, he knew there was something seriously wrong.
After the first shot rang out, he grabbed his mother's and brother’s hands and began to run toward the back of the store. He heard three shots in all before he made it to the exit.
Jesus Bustamante, 27, was at the Wal-Mart with his cousin, Emmanuel Florez, 26, to buy an Xbox when the shooting began.
“Should we run?” Florez asked his cousin as the shots rang out, Bustamante said. “Hell yes, we should run!” Bustamante replied, and the pair joined the other shoppers and Wal-Mart employees flooding out the back of the store.
The attacker or attackers shot and killed one person inside before going to the back of the store and carrying out a “suicide pact” as police arrived, McMahill told reporters.
Outside, police were already swarming. Bustamante said he saw one motorcycle officer dump his motorcycle in his haste to get inside. One police officer got inside the store, then came back out to tell everyone outside to get away.
“If you know the cops are scared, then you know it’s dangerous,” Bustamante said.
Alize Harper, who had been selling newspapers, added: “You don’t think this kind of thing can happen. It’s a Sunday, you’re selling newspapers, and all of a sudden a man walks in and starts shooting up a Wal-Mart. What is going on here?”
Police were working quickly to get an answer after they gained control of the scene, and bused away witnesses for police interviews.
“We express our deepest condolences to everyone who have been affected by this senseless act of violence,” Brooke Buchanan, a spokeswoman for Wal-Mart, said in a statement. “Our store is currently closed. This is still an active investigation and we are working with local police.”
A man who described himself as the manager of the Wal-Mart, Jason, declined to speak with media as he gathered contact information for other people who were at the store.
A woman asked him if she should give him a call later Sunday evening, and he replied, “I don’t think I’m going to be going home tonight.”
Glionna reported from Las Vegas and Pearce from Los Angeles. Times staff writer Ryan Parker, in Los Angeles, contributed to this report.
Source: http://www.latimes.com/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-las-vegas-cops-killed-in-ambush-20140608-story.html
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