The shooting suspect perpetrated in the state of mainenortheast of USAwhich left 18 dead, was found dead with a self-inflicted gunshot wound, putting an end to an intense search that lasted more than two days.
(Read here: Robert Card, the main suspect in the Maine shootings, is found dead)
“I breathe a sigh of relief tonight knowing that Robert Card “He is no longer a threat to anyone,” Governor Janet Mills said at a press conference, referring to the 40-year-old man.s, suspect in the deadly shootings that left 18 dead.
“He is dead (…) Maine State Police have located the body,” he confirmed.
Maine Public Safety Commissioner Michael Sauschuck confirmed that the body was found at 7:45 p.m. (local time) near a river in Lisbon Falls, a town located about 15 kilometers from Lewinston.
Sauschuck added that Card was found dead with an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound.and that he still couldn’t say when it would have happened.
US media reported that Card’s body was found near a recycling center, from which he had recently been fired.
I will continue to do everything in my power to end this epidemic of gun violence.
Card was accused of carrying out the deadliest mass shooting of the year on Wednesday night.
In a statement from the White House, the president Joe Biden said, “I will continue to do everything in my power to end this epidemic of gun violence. The Lewiston community, and all Americans, deserve nothing less.”
Authorities on Friday identified the victims, who range from a couple in their 70s to a 14-year-old boy who died alongside his father.
Earlier, police and the FBI had fanned out to several locations, including a riverbank where the suspect’s car was found, and planned to explore the depths with sonar and divers.
Sauschuck had said earlier in a press conference that businesses in the area could reopen, and hunting had been prohibited in Lewiston and nearby towns.
The clues and the city in which the search focused
The search seemed about to end on Thursday night, when the police had gathered in front of a house that belonged, according to a neighbor interviewed by AFP, to the suspect’s family.
“Please come out,” police officers repeated throughout the night through megaphones, “we would like to speak with you.” But the police left without making any statements to the journalists, who were very numerous at the scene, without having located the suspect.
Drones, helicopters and armored vehicles had been deployed in the surrounding area.
Lewiston became a ghost town for two days after its 36,000 inhabitants were ordered by the authorities to confine themselves to their homes due to the danger of Card.
Educational centers and businesses closed their doors and the high school parking lot was taken over by police officers dressed in uniform and armed to the teeth.
Seven people, a woman and six men, lost their lives in the bowling alley, eight in the bar-restaurant, about twelve minutes away, and finally three injured people died in the hospital.
Witnesses at the Just-In-Time bowling alley described customers hiding under tables and in machines at the end of the lanes. “I threw myself on top of my daughter, and my mother on top of me,” Riley Dumont described to ABC.
A photograph released by police showed a man dressed in a brown T-shirt entering the establishment, with a semi-automatic rifle over his shoulder.
The worst massacre of 2023
Wednesday’s massacre is the deadliest in the United States since that of the Uvalde school in Texaswhere a shooter killed 19 children and two teachers in May 2022.
The country is paying a very high price for the proliferation of firearms in its territory and the ease with which citizens have access to them.
Excluding suicides, more than 15,000 people have died from gun violence since the beginning of the year in the country, according to the non-governmental organization Gun Violence Archive.
Maine is one of the states with the lowest homicide rate. The 18 deaths on Wednesday represent, according to the Everytown association, more than the annual average of murders by firearms in the state.
AFP
#death #Robert #Card #suspect #Maine #massacre