BOULDER, Colorado (AP) – Police officers and former associates of a 21-year-old man accused of killing 10 people in a Colorado supermarket described the suspect as a person prone to sudden rage who was suspended in the ‘institute for a sudden attack on a classmate that left the student bleeding.
Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa, who comes from the suburb of Arvada, Denver, was jailed on Tuesday for murder charges a day after the attack on a King Soopers grocery store in Boulder. He was due to make a first court appearance on Thursday.
Alissa had bought an assault weapon on March 16, six days before the attack, according to an affidavit of arrest. Investigators have not established any reason, Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty said. It was not immediately known where the suspect bought the weapon.
Among the dead it was Boulder police officer Eric Talley, 51, who was the first to arrive after answering a call about gunshots and someone carrying a gun, police chief Maris Herold said.
A law enforcement official reported on the shooting said the suspect’s family told investigators they believed Alissa was suffering from some type of mental illness, including delusions. Relatives described times when Alissa told them people were following or persecuting him, that they said they could have contributed to the violence, the official said. The officer was not allowed to speak publicly and spoke with The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
After the shooting, detectives went to Alissa’s house and found her sister-in-law, who told them she had been playing with a gun she believed looked like a “machine gun” about two days earlier, according to an affidavit of arrest. .
No one answered the door on Tuesday at Arvada’s house which was believed to be owned by the suspect’s father. The two-story house with a three-car garage is located in a relatively new middle and upper class neighborhood.
When she was a high school student in 2018, Alissa was found guilty of assaulting a classmate in class after throwing him to the ground, after climbing on him and punching him several times, according to a sworn statement of the police.
Alissa “got up in the classroom, walked over to the victim and“ chilled ”him in the head,” the affidavit said. Alissa complained that the student had mocked him and called him “racial names” weeks earlier, according to the affidavit. An Arvada police report of the incident said the victim was bleeding and vomiting after the assault. Alissa was suspended from school and sentenced to parole and community service.
One of her high school wrestling teammates, Angel Hernandez, said Alissa was furious after losing a game in practice once, letting out a stream of invectives and shouting that she would kill everyone. Hernandez said the coach kicked Alissa out of the team for the finish.
“He was one of those guys with a short fuse,” Hernandez said. “Once he gets angry, it’s as if something takes over and it’s not him. It can’t be stopped right now. ”
Hernandez said Alissa would also act weird at times, turning around suddenly or looking over her shoulder. “He was saying to me,‘ Have you seen it? Have you seen it? “We wouldn’t see anything. We always thought he was messing with us.”
Arvada police investigated, but withdrew a criminal offense complaint by the suspect in 2018, Detective David Snelling said. The man was also cited for speeding in February. “Our community is obviously concerned and upset that the suspect lived here,” Snelling said.
After dark Tuesday night, about 100 people cried at a makeshift monument near the supermarket that was adorned with wreaths, candles, banners that said “#Boulderstrong” and 10 crosses with blue hearts and the name of the victims. There were therapy dogs available to provide comfort.
Four young girls crowded in the cold, one of them crying as she recalled how they had protested the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Others remembered the 1999 massacre at Columbine High School and the 2012 Aurora cinema massacre.
Homer Talley, 74, described his son Eric as a devoted father who “knew the Lord.” He had seven children, ages 7 to 20.
The other dead were identified as Denny Stong, 20; Neven Stanisic, 23; Rikki Olds, 25; Tralona Bartkowiak, 49; Suzanne Fountain, 59; Teri Leiker, 51; Kevin Mahoney, 61; Lynn Murray, 62; and Jodi Waters, 65.
Leiker, Olds and Stong worked at the supermarket, said former teammate Jordan Sailas.
Kim Córdoba, president of the United 7 Local Fooders and Commercial Workers, which represents more than 30 employees of the store, said the workers did their best to make customers safe.
“They grabbed everyone they could and took them to the back room or other areas of the store to hide them or take them out the back dock,” Córdoba said. “And these poor grocery workers have just gone through hell in general working through COVID throughout the last year of the pandemic.”
Monday’s attack was the seventh mass murder this year in the United States, following the March 16 shooting that left eight people dead in three massage parlors in the Atlanta area, according to a compiled database by the AP, USA Today and Northeastern University.
There follows a pause in mass killings during the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, which recorded the lowest number of such attacks in eight years, according to the database, which tracks mass killings defined as four or more dead, without including the handle.
In Washington, President Joe Biden convened Congress to tighten the nation’s weapons laws. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer pledged to introduce two bills passed by the House to demand an expanded background check for gun buyers. Biden supports the measures, but they face a tougher path to pass in a narrowly divided Senate with a narrow democratic majority.
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Associated Press writers Michael Balsamo in Washington, Jim Anderson in Denver, and AP staff members from across the U.S. contributed to this report. Nieberg is a member of the body of the Associated Press / Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a national nonprofit services program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on covert issues.