What you need to know about the mall shooting in Allen, Texas
- A gunman killed eight people Saturday at a Dallas-area outlet mall.
- The 33-year-old shooter, a neo-Nazi sympathizer with an AR-15-style assault weapon, was killed by an officer who happened to be at the shopping center in Allen, authorities said.
- The victims include a young boy and his parents, two elementary school-age sisters, a security guard working toward his goals and an engineer with a new master’s degree.
Mall shooting victims identified
The eight people gunned down at the outlet mall have been identified by school officials, the Texas Department of Public Safety and a verified online fundraiser.
They are:
• Kyu Song Cho, 37
• Cindy Cho, 35
• James Cho, 3
• Daniela Mendoza, 4th grade
• Sofia Mendoza, 2nd grade
• Aishwarya Thatikonda, 26
• Elio Cumana-Rivas, 32
• Christian LeCour, 23
Read more about the victims here.
'Hero' officer saved countless lives, Allen council member says
The "hero" police officer who shot and killed the gunman Saturday "saved an untold number of lives that day," Allen City Council member Dave Cornette said.
The officer, who happened to be at the shopping center, has not been publicly identified.
"I met the officer, shook their hand and thanked the officer for being a hero," Cornette said in a statement Monday. "I told the officer if they or their family needed anything please reach [out] and I will see that their needs are met."
"There is absolutely no doubt the officer saved an untold number of lives that day," he said.
Twitter users said gory videos appeared without warning
Graphic videos and images of the aftermath of two bloody events over the weekend in Texas — a shooting at a mall and a car’s plowing into a group of migrants — circulated widely on Twitter over the last couple of days, generating renewed concern about the platform’s moderation capabilities under CEO Elon Musk.
It was imagery that some users said was pushed into their “For You” feed, which was introduced this year and surfaces content based on Twitter’s recommendation system and users’ preferences based on whom they follow. Users can choose between the “For You” feed and the “Following” feed, which shows only tweets from accounts a user follows.
David Hogg, a gun control advocate and survivor of the shooting at a high school in Parkland, Florida, tweeted Sunday (in response to a poll from Musk asking whether he had succeeded in improving the platform in the last six months) that graphic images had been pushed into his “For You” feed.
“Well I saw a significantly higher number of photos and videos of dead people from the most recent mass shooting in Texas on my For you page and timeline yesterday than I ever had seen before,” Hogg tweeted. “So not great in that respect.”
The concern was offset by some calls for the graphic images to be more widely distributed, a decades-old argument that has gained some renewed momentum in recent years around the gun control debate.
6-year-old is family's only survivor in mall shooting
Cho Kyu Song, 37, Kang Shin Young, 35, and their 3-year-old son, James, were shot and killed, according to a GoFundMe campaign created to help the family and The Dallas Morning News, which cited the Houston office of the South Korean Consulate.
The only surviving member of the family is the couple’s oldest child, William, who just turned 6, according to the fundraising page.
Young-Hwan Kim, South Korea’s consul in Houston, told NBC News that the family were not Korean nationals but Americans. He declined to confirm the identities of the victims and said he had been in contact with the family.
3 patients still listed in critical condition
Three people shot at Allen Premium Outlets remained in critical condition Monday, hospital officials said.
They are being treated at Medical City McKinney along with another patient in fair condition, Medical City Healthcare said.
The health care company also reported one patient in fair condition at Medical City Plano and another in good condition at Medical City Children’s Hospital.
Texas mall shooter shared apparent extremist beliefs online
Extremist beliefs were shared on a social media page that appeared to belong to the shooter who killed eight people at a Dallas-area outlet mall over the weekend. Posts that included rants against Jews, women and racial minorities have been shared on the account since September.
Mauricio Garcia, 33, maintained a profile on the Russian social networking platform OK.ru, which included posts referring to extremist online forums such as 4chan and content from white nationalists, including Nick Fuentes, an antisemitic white nationalist provocateur.
A post last month included photos of Allen Premium Outlets, where a mass shooting occurred Saturday afternoon, as well as photos of a flak vest emblazoned with patches, one of them with the initialism for “Right Wing Death Squad,” a popular meme among far-right extremist groups.
Another post included a series of shirtless pictures with visible white power tattoos, including SS lightning bolts and a swastika.
A senior law enforcement source said Garcia’s social media activity on the site is part of the investigation.
Gunman was kicked out of Army after 3 months
The shooter who went on a rampage at Allen Premium Outlets joined the Army in June 2008 but was kicked out after three months for a physical or mental condition, an Army spokesperson said.
He was terminated without having completed initial entry training.
“He was not awarded a military occupational specialty. He had no deployments or awards,” spokesperson Heather J. Hagan said.
The nature of the discharge was not disclosed.
“He was separated under the 2005 edition of Army Regulation 635-200, paragraph 5–17, other designated physical or mental conditions,” an Army official said.
Sisters in 2nd and 4th grades among victims, school district says
Two sisters from the same elementary school were among the eight people killed in Saturday's shooting.
They were identified as Daniela Mendoza, a fourth grader, and Sofia Mendoza, a second grader, Wylie Independent School District Superintendent David Vinson said in a letter to families. Both attended Cox Elementary in Sachse, Texas.
Their mother, Ilda, remains in critical condition, Vinson added.
The school's principal, Krista Wilson, described the girls as “rays of sunshine.”
Vinson wrote: “Words cannot express the sadness we feel as we grieve the loss of our students. Our thoughts and prayers are with the Mendoza family, the families of the victims, and all those affected by this senseless tragedy.
"Daniela and Sofia will not be forgotten. Hug your kids, and tell them you love them," he added.
Cox families and staff members were notified of the deaths, and a crisis team is “ready to provide any support that is needed,” the letter said.
Texas bill to raise minimum age to buy semi-automatic guns passes committee level
Hours after Texas Democrats held a news conference calling on state legislators to take action on gun safety, a House bill that would raise the minimum age to buy semi-automatic guns from 18 to 21 passed the committee level.
State Sen. Roland Gutierrez tweeted Monday afternoon that House Bill 2744 passed the Community Safety Committee and will head to the House Calendar Committee.
“Our voices are making a difference. The push to bring this bill to the House floor continues,” he said.
The bill is backed by families who lost loved ones in the Uvalde school massacre. In that case, the gunman used an AR-15-style rifle that he bought days after he turned 18.
At a news conference earlier in the day, Gutierrez slammed Gov. Greg Abbott for blaming past shootings on mental health issues and extremist views.
“It’s not mental health. It’s not extremists,” he said. “These are the guns that you’re letting everyone have with impunity.”
He said the state leads the country in mass shootings.
“This governor has done nothing about it,” he said.
