A man stood in the parking lot of a shopping mall in Southern California on Saturday and fired 50 shots into the air.
Police didn’t say why, but his actions prompted many stores in the open-air Fashion Island mall in Newport Beach to lock their doors.
No one was hurt by the bullets raining down, but one person suffered minor injuries while trying to flee the area, police said.
Newport Beach Police quickly took the man, 42-year-old Marcos Sarinana Gurrola, into custody, but not before calling in the bomb squad when the man said he had more ammunition in the trunk of his car.
Suspect Arrested After Firing Weapon in Parking Lot nixle.us/84KMJ
— Newport Beach Police (@NewportBeachPD) December 16, 2012
The incident came a day after a mass shooting at an elementary school in Connecticut, and last week’s fatal shooting at a mall in Oregon.
Patrick Wyrick was returning to his car when he heard the shots and, from behind the safety of his car, began capturing the scene with camera.
“I wasn't sure they were real or not. Then a heard another set of shots and then another,” he said in a video he posted on YouTube.
“My wife and daughter were at an ice cream shop in the mall when the shooting happened. They ended up running and screaming with everyone toward the opposite side of the mall.”
Other shoppers began tweeting:
There is a shooting at fashion island and I'm trapped in a department store. This is scary
— Emily Altieri (@e_altieri) December 16, 2012
omg omg omg omg there's a shooting at fashion island. can't go anywhere on lockdown
— Zoë Amelia Klopfer (@zoeboo2) December 16, 2012
if you think outlawing guns is going to help you are not living in reality. Outlaw them and only criminalsand police will have them. don't forget, the guns in this case were owned legally by rich, white people.
Very simple, what this guy did was to strike fear in the hearts of those shopping and in the area. By that definition he is a terrorist, needs to be found guilty and locked up for a minimum of 25 years, with the stipulation if and when he gets out he can never possess another firearm. Weed them out now, so they don't become a problem later.
FACT: The Reagan Administration shut down the mental health resources. Our country have no resources for mentally, unstable individuals and their families. We need to focus on prevention and provide treatment for this much neglected area. Research has proven: No correlation between gun laws or availability of guns, financial status and violence. Violence is the direct result of untreated mental illness. While psychiatric care is not as popular as tax breaks for the wealthy, it is essentail in stabilizing our culture.
I support California's right to secede. I'm sure they will be a beacon of civilization to guide other nations. They will teach us the darkness and primitiveness of our ways. Let's give California the great chance it deserves to teach us how their way of life will stand in mockery of our existence. I wish to learn how state control will produce a nation of safety and prosperity. Only by marching toward that great glory on the horizon will they ever be able to prove how wrong the rest of us are. Please, my fellow Americans, let us stand together and give California the moral support it needs to just go away and never come back. And for that matter, let's let New York and southern New England march off to that glory as well.
What would these stupid adolescent kids do if they couldn't tweet OMG everytime anything at all happens around them? Their thumbs would go into shock.
Aside from this shooter being an attention-getting copycat, the disturbing part is that idiots immediately start sending out tweets to let their followers know they are "like, totally freaked out" instead of calling 911. These fools have no common sense.
Perhaps they called 911 first...In the day, they would have called loved ones, tweeting is today's emotional response. sheesh
Obviously-A MAN! when you hear a car peeling out-A MAN!! when you hear about a gun being fired in publik-A MAN- First Law of the Land-Prohibit Gun Ownership by Men unless they are a rancher, farmer, active duty military or police or prison system. Sorry guys but your gender is not trustworthy and has gone insane. Too bad you simply do not menstruate which is a little more trustworthy over the life span. Your gender with that Y chromosome and testosterone is simply Too Too violent!
@soshaljustic, I hope you're joking. Violence isn't only a male thing, and all men aren't violent/aggressive people. It's a "stupid" issue, rather than a gender issue.
"be a beacon of civilization to guide other nations."
You joking or what ???
No country in the world wants to be "guided by " you.
Stop living in a dream and join the real world.Your country is considered to be very violent and primitive.
The last days shows that once again.
I'm not agreeing with are any moral leader, but are you serious posting comments that sound like we are the only country with problems with violence??? Just check the map, we are much better than some countries and much worse than others, but we are not the only!!!!!!
Welcome to the United States. Now turn around immediately before someone kills you. Sadly the US is becoming a danger zone not much different from the middle east.
That is an ignorant comment.
We aren't worse than most of the world, we just get the most attention. We have a lot of work to do to keep our children safe, but unless you can afford to live in a fortress in Monaco, you have risks everywhere.
Suppose people can choose to be out in public with a weapon and not hurt someone….Chalk one up for the NRA.
pot should be legal.. people would be to lazy to do a shooting once their high
No laws will stop mass murders. People willing to die and/or commit murders are more than willing to buy arms illegally. About 30% of our murders by gun are from illegally obtained weapons.
You're right, we do deserve to be protected, by ourselves. Instead of bashing the NRA, you should be supporting them. Hopefully we can get a sheriff here in So. Cal that will let us trained individuals protect the herd. Until then, the wolves will feed off the sheep, who refuse to believe that a gun is the problem. The gun is not the problem. It never has been, and never will be the problem. The problem is that here in America, we don't have a gun problem, we have a hate problem.
Allow more citizens to either open carry or conceal carry, train those who wish to be trained, lax laws that punish law abiding citizens when it comes to firearms (get rid of extended magazine capacity/bullet button.)
GUN CONTROL DOESN'T WORK.
CRIMINALS WILL NOT FOLLOW GUN LAWS.
Putting stricter gun laws in place only hurts those who are willing to follow them.
So, I have a question for you then. How do you explain the ENORMOUS difference in gun deaths in the U.S. as opposed to other industrialized nations who have far more strict gun laws? Last year in the U.S. over 9,000 people were killed by guns. The next highest numer was from Canada... at under 200. Really? Explain to me how letting everyone have guns has worked for us?? Hand guns are completely unnessecary for the average citizen to own. Are deaths from guns still going to happen? Sure. But if you make it more difficult to get the guns, suddenly the number of deaths goes WAY down. And don't spout that "but I need to protect myself" crap. If you feel a desperate need to use a gun to protect yourself, get a hunting rifle and keep that by your bed. The gangs will probably always have guns, but when was the last time you heard about a member of a local gang going into a school and killing 20 6 and 7 year olds? Your average guy who suddenly goes crazy and shoots up a school might have gotten those guns illegally but he still had relatively easy access (stolen from Mom, for instance). If you take that away, you don't just say "I'm going to go buy me a gun on the black market." Most people without criminal records don't have the first clue how to go "buy a gun on the black market."
Again, gun deaths will still happen, but if stricter gun laws will cut that number from over 9,000 to even under 1,000.... Then why not do it? I fail to see how the NRA (or anyone!!!) can argue those numbers.
Sam, I'm afraid you need to check your facts. Brazil, an industrialized nation with 200,000,000 people, has very strict gun control laws and have over 50,000 murders per year – over 6 times the US murder rate. Obviously it hasn't fixed the problem for them.
And, if availability of guns is the problem, why didn't we see these things in the 1950s, when anyone could walk into a hardware or sporting good store and buy a Browning Hi-Power 9mm semi-auto pistol, with 13-round mags, or an M-1 semiautomatic military surplus rifle with 30-round magazines, no background check, no paperwork, no questions? These guns are just as deadly as those today, and were much more readily available, and more of the population owned guns. I think the problem is a LITTLE more complex than guns, and the solution is a little more complicated than simply banning them.
It's amazes me how many people spout non-facts to support their postion. Fact, CA has very strict gun laws. TX has more relaxed laws. CA has a much higher murder by gun rate according to FBI data. NJ is also in the top 10 as is Washington D.C(ranked 7th and has a gun ban in place).
People like this guy ruin it for rightfully legally gun owners.
Americans' obsession with firearms = spiritual sickness. Period.