US mall gunman picked victims at random

The gunman who killed eight shoppers in a busy US mall apparently chose his victims at random, police said today.

Robert Hawkins, 19, had recently split with his girlfriend and been fired from his job at McDonald’s. He had a criminal record for drug and alcohol offences and had been thrown out of his parents’ house.

Yesterday he took a rifle into the sprawling Westroads Mall in Omaha, Nebraska, and opened fire.

As shoppers and workers scrambled for cover, eight people were killed and five wounded before Hawkins killed himself.

He left a note which said: “Now I’ll be famous.”

It was the second mass shooting at a US mall this year. In February, five people were were killed in Salt Lake City by an 18-year-old gunman who was shot and killed by police.

Police Chief Thomas Warren said the shooting appeared to be random. He gave no motive for the attack, but promised more details later today.

Hawkins was thrown out by his family about a year ago. He moved in with a friend’s family, and Debora Maruca-Kovac and her husband welcomed him into their home and tried to help him.

“When he first came in the house, he was introverted, a troubled young man who was like a lost pound puppy that nobody wanted,” Mrs Maruca-Kovac said.

The night before the shooting Hawkins and her sons showed her an SKS semiautomatic Russian military rifle.

She said she thought the gun belonged to a member of Hawkins’ family but she did not think much of it as it looked too old to work.

Records showed Hawkins had a felony drug conviction and several misdemeanour cases, including an arrest 11 days before the shooting for having alcohol as a minor. He was due in court in two weeks.

Mrs Maruca-Kovac said Hawkins was fired from McDonald’s this week and had recently broken up with a girlfriend. She said he phoned her at about 1pm yesterday, telling her he had left a note. She tried to get him to explain.

“He said, ’It’s too late,”’ and hung up.

In the note Hawkins wrote that he was “sorry for everything” and would not be a burden on his family anymore. More ominously, he added, “Now I’ll be famous.”

Mrs Maruca-Kovac went to her job as a nurse at the Nebraska Medical Center, where victims of the shooting soon began to arrive.

The first emergency call came in at 1.42pm and the shooting was already over when police arrived six minutes later, authorities said.

Hawkins opened fire in a Von Maur store, part of a Midwestern chain.

Mickey Vickory, who worked in the store’s third-floor service department, said she heard shots and went with colleagues and customers into a back room, emerging about a half-hour later when police shouted to come out with their hands up. As police led them to another part of the mall for safety, they saw the victims.

President Bush was in Omaha yesterday for a fundraiser, but left about an hour before the shooting.

“Having just visited with so many members of the community in Omaha today, the president is confident that they will pull together to comfort one another,” a White House spokesman said.