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Gunman, 2 women dead in Indiana grocery store shooting

Posted at 7:03 AM, Jan 16, 2014
and last updated 2014-01-16 09:03:43-05

By Lateef Mungin

(CNN) — A gunman killed two women inside an Indiana grocery store Wednesday night before police rushed to the scene and gunned him down when he fired at them, authorities said.

The shootings happened in a sprawling grocery store in Elkhart, Indiana.

Officers arrived just after 10 p.m. and found the armed man in the store, according to Indiana State Police Trooper Brooks Shirk.

The two Elkhart City police officers shot the gunman to death when he turned his weapon on them, according to CNN affiliate WNDU.

Police found the bodies of two women aisles apart inside the store, both of them shot by the gunman, Shirk said. One of the women was a shopper, the other an employee.

It was unclear whether the suspect knew the victims or if there was any connection between the three, Shirk said.

Tony Beltran told WNDU his mother was working at the store at the time of the shootings.

“She told me that she heard what sounded like gunshots and everybody around her was telling her they heard gunshots,” Beltran told the station. “Obviously I was afraid. I said a quick prayer.”

Police said the man used a semi-automatic handgun, and authorities also recovered a knife.

“It’s a huge crime scene,” Indiana State Police Sgt. Trent Smith told WNDU. “The area where the shootings happened in the store are basically from one end of the store to the next.”

The names of the gunman and victims were not released. Neither was a motive.

“You never know why this happens,” Smith said. “People are depressed. People do things that are not rational. You just can’t explain these things a lot of the times.”

CNN’s Marlena Baldacci contributed to this report.

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