The Associated Press
CHRISTIANSBURG, Va. — A man shot two women at a mall branch of a community college in Virginia Friday before he was subdued by police, a city official said.
One of the victims was airlifted to a hospital and the other was taken by ambulance for treatment, said Christianburg city spokeswoman Becky Wilbur. Their conditions and identities were not immediately available.
The name of the gunman was not immediately released and a motive for the shootings was not known.
The shootings occurred at a mall in this town of approximately 21,000 in southwestern Virginia that includes a branch campus of New River Community College.
Student Josh Brown said he was working on a computer near the classrooms when the shots were fired.
“I heard one gunshot, and I didn’t know what it was. ... I saw people running out,” he told The Roanoke Times.
Brown then got up and ran out himself.
“I’ll be scared to come back to school,” he told the newspaper as he started to cry. “What’s wrong with people? Who would do something like this?”
Friday isn’t usually a busy day at the school’s mall campus, Ben Kramer, an activities counselor for the community college, told the newspaper. Enrollment is roughly 1,500, and about a third of those students likely were on campus, he said.
Wilburn said emergency officials received a 911 call around 2 p.m. about someone with a gun at the college’s satellite location in the mall outside of Blacksburg, home to Virginia Tech. The caller reported hearing shots fired.
Wilburn said authorities do not believe there’s any continuing threat to the community.
Montgomery County Schools were briefly locked down as a precaution.