Police baffled by gunman’s motive for 7-hour rampage in Michigan

A gunman who seemed to choose his victims at random opened fire outside an apartment complex, a car dealership and a restaurant in Michigan, killing at least six people during a rampage that lasted nearly seven hours, police said.

Authorities identified the shooter as 45-year-old Jason Dalton, an Uber driver who police said had no criminal record.

They could not say what motivated him on Saturday night to target victims with no apparent connection to him or to each other.

“How do you go and tell the families of these victims that they weren’t targeted for any reason other than they were there to be a target?” Kalamazoo county prosecutor Jeff Getting said on Sunday at a news conference.

Dalton was arrested early Sunday in Kalamazoo following a massive manhunt. He was expected to be arraigned on Monday on charges of murder and attempted murder.

Kalamazoo County Undersheriff Paul Matyas described a terrifying series of attacks that began about 6pm on Saturday outside the Meadows apartment complex on the eastern edge of Kalamazoo County, where a woman was shot multiple times. She was expected to survive.

A little more than four hours later and 15 miles away, a father and his 18-year-old son were fatally shot while looking at cars at the dealership.

Fifteen minutes after that, five people were gunned down in the parking lot of a Cracker Barrel restaurant along Interstate 94, Mr Matyas said. Four of them died.

A 14-year-old girl had earlier been reported among the fatalities, based on a pronouncement by medical officials. But police later said that she was taken to hospital in critical condition.

Uber says man suspected of going on western Michigan shooting rampage that left 6 dead was one of its drivers https://t.co/J4C4ko0UWk

— The Associated Press (@AP) February 21, 2016