A long-standing dispute sparked a shooting at a crowded North
Carolina shopping mall on Christmas Eve, police said, and an off-duty
officer fatally shot a man who pointed a gun in his direction.
Police
said no one else was shot and there were no other reports of injuries.
The shooting was not a random act but rather the result of a feud among
people who knew each other - though there was no indication it was
gang-related, Chief Kerr Putney of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police
Department said.
During the fight, a weapon was brandished and
shots were fired at about 14:00 at Northlake Mall in Charlotte, Putney
said. Shoppers who were crowding the mall for last-minute gifts hid in
stores and locked themselves inside, officials said. Police could be
seen blocking all mall entrances.
Chaos erupts
"I thought someone dropped something. It was extremely loud. Didn't think anything of it," Wallace said. "You don't think gunshots. But then I heard a rapid fire. Once hearing that, there was no mistaking it. It sounded like someone was unloading a clip."
Chaos erupted as shoppers dove for cover or tried to get out the door, Wallace said.
Don Willis, who works as a valet at the mall, said he heard gunshots, then saw a wave of people exiting the mall.
"It was wild. I heard the first shot and I thought, 'Wait. What was that?' And kind of like started turning around and walking and saw this huge line of people - wave of people coming - and I thought a bomb was about to go off, and I just took off," he said.
Putney said Officer Thomas Ferguson was working off-duty at the mall when he heard the shots and confronted the man who pointed a gun in his direction.
The officer then "fired his service weapon," Putney said. The suspect was given emergency aid, but medics pronounced him dead shortly afterward, officials said. Police identified him as Daquan Antonio Westbrook, 18.
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