An Indiana supermarket shooting left three dead, including the gunman. The Martin’s Super Market in Elkhart was the site of an active shooting late Wednesday evening, police officer remained on the premises until the early morning hours. The town has a population of around 51,000 people and is about 15 miles from South Bend.
A Martin’s Super Market employee, an Elkhart grocery store shopper and the –year-old gunman are all dead. Both of the shooting victims were women, one was 20 and the other 44 years old. Indiana State Police Officers currently believe the gunman planned the supermarket shooting in advance. Law enforcement investigators are currently searching the gunman’s home, which is located about two miles away from Martin’s Supermarket.
Indiana State Police Sgt. Trent Smith had this to say about the Elkhart grocery store shooting:
“Obviously there was some type of planning that went into this. This wasn’t a spur of the moment thing. The quick action of the Elkhart City Police Department responding to this active shooter undoubtedly saved several lives tonight. There’s not a day that goes by, it seems like anymore, where we’re not learning of a school shooting or at a business… we hope that this would never come to our hometown and here it is.It’s a huge crime scene. The areas where the shootings happened in the store are basically from one end of the store to the next. There were several rounds fired in there. “
The Indiana supermarket shooting alert came into police dispatch around 10 pm on Wednesday evening. Law enforcement officers arrived at the scene within three minutes of the grocery store shooting emergency call. Once inside the Elkhart store, officers heard gunfire and found the gunman who was pointing a handgun at the head either a store staffer of shopper.
Elkhart police officer opened fire on the gunman, who ultimately sustained multiple gunshot wounds. Once the threat was eliminated the officers searched the store. The bodies of the two dead women were found approximately 15 aisles apart. No one else in the store at the time of the shooting was injured.Although the Martin’s Super Market investigation is still ongoing, police officers do not currently believe that the Indiana gunman knew the victims.
A message posted on the Martin’s Super Markets Facebook page reads:
“Thank you to our community for your thoughts and prayers tonight. We will comment further when we can do so responsibly and appropriately.”
[Image Source: Screengrab]