Shooting at West Edmonton Mall forces lockdown
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Summary
Four males were shot and injured outside of West Edmonton Mall in the early evening hours of July 31st, 2019. The mall was placed on lockdown and the area surrounding it was cordoned off. A handgun was recovered from inside the mall, but no suspects have been identified. Police do not believe this was a random act of violence.
Transcript
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Good morning everyone and thank you for joining us here today. My name is Darren
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Dirkall and I'm currently in the Asking Chief position for the Eminent Police Service and
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we've asked you to join us here today for a few reasons. First, we want to provide you
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with some additional context around the shootings at Westthampton Mall. Secondly, we want to
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reassure the citizens of Edmonton that their safety is still sound and we believe this was
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a targeted incident. It wasn't random in nature. And finally, to correct some of the misinformation
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out there that has been circulating online and social media. So last night around 7.40
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PM police responded to a report of a shooting at Westthampton Mall and it was reported that
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four males left the mall and went to their vehicle. When a second vehicle, a white coloured SUV,
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approached them and subsequently resulted in an exchange of gunfire. Two of the males collapsed
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on the pavement with serious injuries and the two others fled into the mall. One into the
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Wild West shooting range with gunshot wounds while the other fled through the mall and we
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do not believe that individual sustained any injuries. And at this time, the fourth male
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has not been located nor have the occupants of the white SUV. That being said, we believe
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we've recovered the SUV that was involved in the shooting. It's just currently being seized
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and it's very preliminary. We can't confirm if it was or not, but we believe it may be. Various
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police resources and units citywide were deployed to the scene, including our tactical team as
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there was an imminent concern for public safety. The mall was placed on lockdown and tactical
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officers swept the building. Officers eventually recovered a handgun from inside the mall believed
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to be that of one of the people involved in the shooting. As mentioned in our updates overnight,
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we believe this was a targeted incident between two groups and the events leading up to the shooting
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are evidence of that. Who those groups are and their motivations behind the shooting is still not
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clear. However, we do not believe there is any risk to the community at this time. As with any major
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incident in a public place, we understand citizens are very concerned, especially those who were either
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working or visiting the mall last night. We know there was a lot of misinformation circulating, including
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suggestions that multiple people were deceased, which was thankfully not the case. I want to be
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clear about one thing though. We are incredibly lucky that nobody lost their lives yesterday,
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that no innocent people were injured and that police were able to respond and now gather evidence.
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We are grateful for all the witnesses who came forward to speak to our officers.
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I want to remind citizens to obtain their news from professional and legitimate media sources,
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or from our website and social media pages directly. This will help limit the misinformation
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that gets out there. And secondly, during a major incident, we ask citizens to refrain from filming and
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posting all this on social media, as this can put you and our officers at risk. And before we move into
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any questions, I want to express my appreciation for West End of Mall Security, who assisted us with this
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lockdown. And I want to thank our officers and first responders who continue to show up day in and
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day out to ensure that our city remains safe. The last three days have been incredibly taxing our
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officers citywide, but they continue to show their resilience and dedication to the job of serving and
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protecting. I'll take a few questions, but understand please that there's still this is very early in
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investigation. So I won't be able to confirm some things. And I won't be able to talk about some
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Arthur Green, Western Standard. Are Mexican drug cartels operating here on the street in Edmonton?
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And how much of a threat is the red alert gang to residents of Edmonton?
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Arthur Green, Western Standard. Right now, with the West End of Mall shooting that we're looking at,
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it doesn't look like that's the case in this instance. Obviously, there's a lot of other
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investigations, intel and other things that we follow up.
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Hi, I'm Morgan Black from Global Edmonton. I'm just wondering, you mentioned that the handgun was
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found inside the mall. Do you mind just being specific about what events took place outside West
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Edmonton Mall related to the shooting and what took place inside the mall?
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Yeah, I'll give you a little bit. So why we say it's targeted is there was four individuals that
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pulled into the parking lot, parked their sedan and went into the mall. When they came back approximately
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40 minutes later, a vehicle that was sitting in the parking lot waiting pulls up and that's when
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the shooting occurred outside the mall. Okay, and then you mentioned there was a handgun found inside
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the mall. Yeah, there was two individuals that ran into the mall, one into the Wild West shooting and
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one into the mall. And I don't know the exact location, garbage can or that kind of thing. I just know that
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a gun has been recovered and we believe it to be involved. And then I'm not sure how deep you can
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get into this, but you said events leading up to the shooting kind of gave you some more information.
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Are you able to be more specific? Yeah, and that's just what I what I reveal now is because of
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security witness statements, you know, they park the vehicle, they go in and it looks like somebody was
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waiting for them and approached when they returned to the vehicle.
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Darcy Rothchan, City News. EPS reiterated this several times with folks getting their news from
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legitimate sources. You mentioned some of the hassles you had with video on social media, false
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reports. Can you just go into a little bit of detail how that makes the investigation a challenge
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when you have all this floating around on social media? Yeah, I mean, what was happening was there was
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a lot of information like I think even one of them was saying that, you know, there's deceased people
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at the mall and that creates a lot of panic, especially for some of the people that were at
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the mall that are maybe paying attention to social media misinformation. They're filming things and
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putting it on on live social media where our officers are clearing the mall and walking through it.
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Well, that can even alert the bad guys. Maybe they're paying attention to it as well, right? So
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it just gets really complicated and it confuses a lot of things. It even confuses our officers
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that are hearing different things, right? They got to stay focused on the evidence that they have
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and what they're gathering in. And the second thing I wanted to ask is you said the driver or
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the white SUV, the occupants were not found yet. So those would be the shooters. So we haven't
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identified them. Haven't identified them yet. You said there's no concern to the community, but
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obviously that must be a concern to you folks. And when I say no concern to the community is more that
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this was targeted event. It wasn't just a random, you know, people leaving the mall that were targeted.
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Obviously, there's still great concern when these things happen in public spaces.
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Hi, Jeremy Thompson, CTD Edmonton. You said that the mall security has been really good to work
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with here. Just can you elaborate at all? You know, what sort of role did they play in the early
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response and sort of help them with this? Yeah, they're video surveillance. They were able to track
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and watch some of the movements that were happening. You know, even lead us toward the evidence or where the
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person exited and we checked the area and found some evidence. Clearing that mall, I think there
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was over 200 people that were in the movie theater. They weren't under imminent threat, but we had to
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get them out as we're clearing it and looking. So, I mean, they assisted us in a lot of that.
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I seem, and maybe it's not my memory, but our organization's memory, there used to be a police
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commuted police station in the mall. I think at one point, maybe the mall had kind of a quasi-police
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force of its own. I guess, would either of those maybe aided in this situation at all? Or I guess,
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what can you say about sort of the response time it takes for police to respond? It's a massive
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mall to kind of go in? Yeah, I mean, having more resources than that available may have. You know,
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we don't know, but I'm sure it doesn't hurt to have resources that are there. Again, the security at
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West Edmonton Mall has been really good and cooperative, and they have a lot of good processes
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and professional people in place to assist us. Preston Hodgkinson with Mix 107.9 and Fort Sask
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Online. You mentioned that you guys believe that you've recovered the SUV involved. Do you expect
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to release any descriptions of the suspects in the near future here? Oh, if we get that, we hope,
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yeah. Like, if it can move this investigation forward, determine who the suspects are and get
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them under arrest, absolutely. But just finding the vehicle, we need to determine if it was the
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actual vehicle involved, and then we've got to do forensics on it. We're not quite there yet.
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And Travis McEwen, CBC News. Do we have the ages of the victims at all?
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I don't have that. I think we're still, just because there was some medical
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intervention. We haven't even had time to actually get a good statement from them yet. We're just
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working on that, I think, now. So yeah, I don't have that information.
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But the lockdown in this instance, who made the call on that? Is that a recommendation
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Yeah, so I was in touch with the duty officer last night, and just in consultation and stuff,
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usually it's his call, or his or her call, to make that determination to ensure public safety,
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and I was aware that that's what was going to happen. And then we liaized with our corporate
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comms to make sure that message gets out to the public as well.
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Hi, Johnny Wakefield with the Edmonton Journal. I'm just wondering, have you been able to
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definitively rule out that this had nothing to do with the violence that we saw over the weekend
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No, we're looking at that. That still hasn't been determined and haven't ruled it in or out.
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But yeah, that's something that we're looking at.
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And just to clarify, is there still an EPS detachment station
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I wouldn't call it a detachment. It was more like, I think they called it like beat officers,
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and that was like the community station that was there.
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Okay, so there was something, but there was not.
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You know, you mentioned this in your opening remarks, talking about
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innocent people could have been hurt in this. And we have seen a lot of increase in gun violence
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in Edmonton. What's your message to people that, you know, this happened in a place where a lot of
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people go every day? This feels very, you know, somebody, anybody could have been there at West Edmonton Mall,
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And that's the concern, right? But, you know, honestly, I think it's
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just being aware of your surroundings, know that, you know, like if something happens,
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or if you see something kind of going down, to make sure that you get to a safe place, really,
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right? It's again, I mean, we're seeing more and more violence, but incidents like this
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are still very isolated and rare. But when they do happen, I mean, be prepared to get to a safe place.
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And then again, broadly speaking, what do you think can be done on the EPS front about this,
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knowing that, again, violent incidences between two groups, but impacting folks who are just going to
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Yeah, I mean, we continue to work with our gang suppression gang teams, alert any intel that
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our frontline members are able to get us. And it's, it's just ongoing investigations and
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trying to get the intel to determine who's involved and why. And if any incidents happen,
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hopefully we can stop them before they get to this level.
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Hi, Keith Jordan from the Edmonton Journal. The people you've identified who were injured,
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have they been helpful at all to your investigation at this point?
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Yeah, it's too early. I think we're right at that stage right now. If I'm correct, I think they're
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trying to get the statements, you know, getting the nods that that's what we're working on. So I,
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it's too early to say if they're uncooperative or not, but hopefully we get what we need.
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And how likely is it, would you say, that there could be further incidents between these two groups?
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Too early to tell. I mean, that's what the intel, what we're working on, right? I don't,
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it's way too early to say that this is an ongoing feud or violence that's going to continue.
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It's always concerning when something that to this level happens when they're targeted,
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because the fear is that the retribution is going to happen, right? But that's something that we're
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working on and hopefully we can make some arrests before that happens.
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Arthur Green, Western Standard again. Can you tell us how many shots were fired in total?
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Oh, I don't have that information. I think that's still to determine that.
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And were you told where the victims, where were they shot? How serious are their injuries?
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Um, you know what, I, I, just from what I've heard, it was like in the arm,
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in the side of the stomach, in the leg, that kind of thing. So serious, but not life threatening.
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Hi, Rod Maldonado from CityTV. He said in your opening remarks that fire,
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gunfire was exchanged. Did both parties shoot and were they injured all from one party?
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Uh, not determined yet because we don't know the suspects from the SUV,
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but at this point I could say that it looked like there was an exchange apparent fire.
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I'm only going to take a couple more. I think as this goes on, it's just...
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This isn't related. I know it's early, but does it seem like this, that there was a
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hit a few months ago in the West End, where an attempted hit on somebody.
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Is this related at all or is this still under the radar as part of...
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It's something we're looking at and honestly, that we've just, we've been having that discussion.
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I know the investigators are talking about that. Um, as we get more forensic evidence,
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as we start getting names and suspect information, intel coming in,
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we'll determine that, but it's still too early to tell.
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What about the difficulty of securing the space as big as West End Channel?
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Do you mind just giving a bit more details into how you...
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Yeah, I think at first it goes, it goes big, but then we, we narrow it down to where,
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you know, the incident happened and where the evidence is and that kind of thing.
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So, I mean, yeah, at first it's very overwhelming, especially when you've got that many people
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moving through and they could, you know, damage some evidence or that kind of thing.
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But, uh, I think we believe that we were able to get the crime scenes down to
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certain areas very quickly and then we did our forensics.
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Sorry, one more really quick clarification. All the shooting was outside the mall?
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Yes. Yes. Correct. Yeah, that's, that's right. All right. Okay. All right. That's, that's it for today.