3 dead, 11 hurt in US grocery store shooting

Gunman injured, as motive for shooting was unclear

ARKANSAS – Three people were killed and 11 others injured in a shooting Friday morning at a grocery store in central Arkansas, police said.

A shooter opened fire at the Mad Butcher grocery store in Fordyce about 11.30am, the Arkansas State Police said in a statement.

The gunman was shot by police and injured before being taken into custody, police said.

Eleven people, including two law enforcement officers, were injured in the shooting. The officers had injuries that were not life-threatening. Mike Hagar, the director of Arkansas State Police, said at a news conference that the shooter’s injury was not life-threatening.

The conditions of the others who were injured ranged from not life-threatening to “extremely critical,” Hagar said.

The motive for the shooting was unclear.

Emergency vehicles are seen at the scene of a shooting incident in Fordyce, Arkansas, the United States, on Friday. (Photo: Reuters)

On Friday evening, police identified the shooting suspect as Travis Eugene Posey, 44, of New Edinburg, a community 10 miles (16 kilometres) southeast of Fordyce.

Posey will be charged with three counts of capital murder, police said, noting that additional charges were pending. An inmate registry for Ouachita County (which adjoins Dallas County, where the shooting took place) showed that he was being held there on charges of murder and attempted murder.

Video and images on social media showed bullet holes in a window of the store, and someone holding what appeared to be a rifle firing shot from the parking lot.

David Rodriguez was filling up his car at a nearby gas station when he heard a few pops that he thought were fireworks.

“Then, all the sudden, mass gunfire between the police and whoever was out in the parking lot,” Rodriguez, 58, of Kingsland, Arkansas, said in an interview. He took out his phone and started filming the shooting before he realised that he had to flee.

Matt Gill was in the Mad Butcher, working his shift as a butcher, when he heard the pops.

“Everybody was like, ‘What’s that noise?'” Gill, 38, said in an interview. “I said, ‘Ma’am, that’s shotgun. We got to go.'”

Gill said he led his co-workers out of the back of the store, but a few store clerks got separated as they fled.

Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders said on social media that she had been updated on the shooting in Fordyce, a city of about 3,300 residents that is about 70 miles (112km) south of Little Rock, Arkansas.

“I am thankful to law enforcement and first responders for their quick and heroic action to save lives,” she wrote.

The White House said in a statement that US President Joe Biden had been briefed on the shooting and that federal authorities were assisting in the investigation.

There have been several shootings at stores in recent years. In 2019, a gunman killed 23 people at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas. In 2021, 10 people were killed by a gunman at a grocery store in Boulder, Colorado. In 2022, a gunman killed 10 people at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.