20 killed after shooting Walmart in Texas, A police suspect suspected of "hate crime""

El Paso Walmart Shooting: Texas authorities are investigating the mass massacre as a possible hate crime, said El Paso Police Chief. A 21-year-old white suspect from Allen, a suburb of Dallas, went to the police in front of the store after the looting.

A man armed with an assault rifle opened fire on customers in a crowded Walmart store in El Paso, Texas, killing 20 people in the latest mass shooting in the United States.

"A day that would have been normal for someone to go shopping quietly has become one of the deadliest days in Texas history," Governor Greg Abbott said, announcing that the death toll would be 20.

Texas authorities are investigating the mass shootings as a possible hate crime, said El Paso Police Chief Greg Allen. A 21-year-old white suspect from Allen, a suburb of Dallas, went to the police in front of the store after the looting.

"Right now, this individual has a manifest that indicates to some extent that he is connected to a potential hate crime," the chief of police said at a news conference.

El Paso, on the border with Mexico, has a predominantly Hispanic population.

After speaking with the governor of Texas, President Donald Trump wrote on Twitter that "relations are very bad, many have been killed", while several Democrats hoping to defeat him in next year's elections said it was high time to tackle an "epidemic" of armed violence. .

It was the second fatal shot in less than a week in a Walmart store in the United States and comes after a mass shooting in California last weekend.

A suspect was arrested, according to the police.

Video footage from camera phones appeared to show several bodies lying on the floor of the store's parking lot, while El Paso authorities issued a desperate appeal for blood donations.

Other footage shows terrified buyers leaving the store as shots were fired.

Two to 82 years

Although police initially withheld an exact figure, NBC reported that 19 people were killed and 40 injured. The Texas attorney general, quoted by the CBS, reportedly stated that between 15 and 20 people had died, while law enforcement officials told ABC News that at least 18 people had been killed.

"I can confirm that there have been deaths. I can't confirm how much," El Paso police Sergeant Robert Gomez told reporters. "There were injuries, there were several. I don't have those numbers right now."

Gomez said Walmart was "at full capacity" at the time of the shooting, with 1,000 to 3,000 customers inside.

Various reports indicated that the age of victims treated in hospitals ranged from two to 82 years.

After officials initially announced that three people had been arrested, Gomez confirmed that one person was in detention.

"I can confirm that he is a white male in his 20s," he told the press.

"We believe he's the only shooter."

The American Media has identified the suspect as 21-year-old Patrick Crusius, who lives in the Dallas area.

A witness named Vanessa testified that she had just parked in Walmart's parking lot when the shooting started.

"You could hear the pops, one after the other, and at that moment, as I turned around, I saw a woman who seemed to be coming out of Walmart and heading towards her car. She had her grocery in her basket and I just saw her fall, " she told Fox News.

The witness told Fox that she saw a man wearing ear protectors open fire.

"He was wearing a black T-shirt and camo pants. He was wearing something to cover his ears, a very thick helmet.

"He was carrying a black gun and he was just showing shots at people and, yeah, the last thing I saw, he shot someone who was in a corner."

After seeing the woman fall into the parking lot, "that's when I thought, Okay, it's not - it's not fireworks ... He was shooting at random. It wasn't for any particular person. cross paths. "

"How are you, brother?»

The video captured by a witness in Walmart's parking lot immediately after the shooting, broadcast on CNN, showed three people lying motionless on the floor.

One of them had fallen next to a truck, while two were on the sidewalk in front of the store entrance. "Ambulance! Help!help!"people were crying as they rushed to the victims.

"How are you, brother, how are you", we heard a man say on the recording.

A person still captured by CCTV showed the shooter wearing what appeared to be an AK-47.

Trump, who spends the weekend at his golf club in New Jersey, was informed of the shooting by Attorney General Bill Barr and Texas Governor Greg Abbott, according to the White House.

The week of armed violence was particularly bad.

Two people died and a policeman was injured on Tuesday in a Walmart store in Mississippi.

Last Sunday, a 19-year-old gunman opened fire at a food festival in Northern California, killing three people, including two children.

Beto O'rourke, a former US congressman from El Paso who is currently running for president, ended his campaign after the shooting.

"I'm incredibly sad and it's very hard to think about it. But I tell you that El Paso is the most powerful place in the world, this community will come together, " he said.

Senator Elizabeth Warren, one of the pioneers of the Democratic Party's presidential nomination, said, " far too many communities have already suffered such tragedies.

"We must act now to put an end to the epidemic of armed violence in our country," she said.

Another presidential candidate, Cory Booker, said the US must " end this national nightmare."