Connor Sturgeon, 25, bought himself an AR-15 on Tuesday, April 4 at a local gun store, all legal of course. Six days later, on Monday, he killed five of his co-workers at the Old National Bank in Louisville, Kentucky.
Despite the fact that it was initially said that he no longer works in that entity, the authorities recognized this Tuesday that he was still an employee of the bank, hence he entered as normal, as if it were another day at work. But he wasn't. Before leaving home he left a note and a voicemail on a friend's phone in which he told her that he “feels suicidal” and that he wanted to “do harm”. He achieved both goals: he died killing.
Investigators believe that Sturgeon, without making it clear why, targeted his colleagues, "they were his target, he knew them," said Mayor Graig Greenberg. That was his suicide mission, before the doors opened to customers.
The interim chief of police, Jacquelynn Gwinn-Villaroel, confirmed on Tuesday that the gunman made a streaming broadcast of his massacre, with four dead in the establishment and a fifth who died in hospital. There were eight other injuries.
Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, confirmed that it immediately withdrew that broadcast. However, there were those who made a capture. In the images, according to this version, a colleague was seen saying good morning and Sturgeon replied "you have to get out of here", brandishing her rifle. She tries to shoot him in the back.
It failed because the weapon was unloaded and locked. After removing the safety and loading her, he fired at that woman, it is unclear if she survived or she is one of the deceased. At no time did the attacker enter other floors and remain in the lobby. He fired from there and after a minute of killing, he sat down and waited for the police to arrive.
This Tuesday the images of the videos recorded by the cameras of the uniforms of the two agents who responded in the first place, Cory Galloway, who was acting as a tutor on the ground for Nickolas Wilt, a rookie who graduated from the academy on the 31st of March.
They arrived at the bank three minutes after the emergency call and six minutes later the attacker had been “neutralized”.
The entity's surveillance cameras allowed us to capture the image of Sturgeon, dressed in jeans, a blue shirt, sneakers, rifle in hand and surrounded by broken glass inside.
"Cover me," Galloway orders his disciple, once he takes the rifle out of the trunk of the car and they begin the approach on foot. Wilt was shot in the head (still in serious condition, although improving) just getting out of the car and approaching the building.
Galloway was able to take refuge behind a stone planter. Sturgeon had foreseen a trap, because the tinted glass of the facade, the reflection of light, and a position higher than the street allowed him to see those who approached him while he was left in the dark. And he knew the ins and outs.
"The gunman has a vision of that officer," Galloway says, seeing his colleague lying down. "We need to go there," he alerts amidst the tension of the moment.
Other police officers appear. More shots are heard. Galloway shoots and yells, "I think he's down." He then approaches the building and approaches the suspect, who is lying on the lobby floor with the AR-15 next to him as a testament.
