Indiana mall shooting: officials identify gunman who killed three people

Authorities on Monday identified the gunman who shot five people at a suburban Indianapolis shopping mall on Sunday, killing three of them, before a shopper shot and killed him.

He was a 20-year-old local man, Jonathan Sapirman, of Greenwood, who began firing after leaving a bathroom at the Greenwood Park Mall shortly before it closed Sunday evening, the Greenwood police chief, James Ison, said at a news conference.

Sapirman continued shooting people until he was shot and killed by 22-year-old Elisjsha Dicken, of nearby Seymour, who was shopping with his girlfriend, said Ison.

Although authorities said Dicken was legally armed, the mall prohibits people from carrying weapons on its property.

As of 1 July, Indiana law allows anyone age 18 or older to carry a handgun in public except for those prohibited for reasons such as having a felony conviction, facing a restraining order or having a dangerous mental illness as determined by a court.

Authorities said Sunday that four of the victims were female and one was male, but they corrected that Monday to two males and three females, including a woman and a 12-year-old girl who were wounded.

Ison said that after Sapirman entered the mall, he walked into a bathroom where he spent about an hour before he emerged and opened fire. He said investigators believe Sapirman spent that time preparing and possibly assembling a disassembled rifle that he had brought in his backpack. He ended up firing 24 rounds within two minutes.