Police have apprehended a 24-year-old accused of killing one person and injuring several others in a shooting earlier Wednesday in Atlanta’s Midtown neighborhood, following an hours-long search and a shelter-in-place order that briefly paralyzed the typically bustling urban area.
This photo released by the Atlanta Police Department of video footage on Wednesday, shows a ... [+]
The Atlanta Police Department announced at about 8 p.m. that suspect Deion Patterson was apprehended, more than seven hours after police first tweeted an “active shooter” was “in the area of 1110 W Peachtree St NW,” the site of Northside Hospital Midtown’s medical office buildings.
Police said one person—a 39-year-old woman whose name has not been made public—was pronounced dead on the scene.
Four people were injured in the attack, all of whom were women ages 25, 39, 56 and 71, including three who remain in critical condition, Atlanta Police Chief Darin Schierbaum said in a press conference Wednesday afternoon.
Police initially urged nearby workers to remain in their buildings, but lifted the shelter-in-place order several hours later.
Authorities released images of the suspect early Wednesday afternoon, which appeared to show a man wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt and a medical mask pointing a handgun into an office space.
Police believe Patterson car-jacked a vehicle as he fled the area, and said he is “believed to be armed and dangerous and should not be approached.”
No additional shots were fired following the initial shooting in the hospital waiting room, according to police.
Atlanta Public Schools said in a statement just before 1:30 p.m. that schools in the area were placed under an “exterior lockdown,” but the school system later said police “assured us that we are in the clear to” dismiss students.
The conditions of the injured victims have not been released. Police also have not suggested a possible motive.
The shooting comes on the heels of several high-profile mass shootings across the country, which have renewed public policy debates about gun control and public safety in the United States. Texas authorities arrested a man Tuesday following a days-long manhunt after he allegedly went on a rampage against his neighbors in the Houston area Friday, killing five—including a 9-year-old. The Texas massacre occurred just weeks after five victims were shot dead at a bank in downtown Louisville, Kentucky, and about a month after six victims—three of them 9-year-old students—were killed at a Christian elementary school in Nashville. President Joe Biden has repeatedly called for stricter gun control on the national level, but leaders of the Republican-controlled House of Representatives have said they have no intention of passing any gun reform bills.
“The time is past due for common sense gun reform,” Atlanta City Councilman Amir Farokhi said in a statement following Wednesday’s shooting.
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