Police tape surrounds the Old National Bank after a gunman opened fire on April 10, 2023 in Louisville, Kentucky.
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Image of Michael Swensen/Getty
Police tape surrounds the Old National Bank after a gunman opened fire on April 10, 2023 in Louisville, Kentucky.
Image of Michael Swensen/Getty
The gunman who killed five people and injured eight others in a shooting in downtown Louisville on Monday legally purchased the AR-15 rifle used in the attack, authorities said. know on Tuesday.
Connor Sturgeon purchased the weapon from a dealer in Louisville on April 4 – six days before the attack – according to Metro Louisville Police Department Interim Superintendent Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel.
Authorities also confirmed that the 25-year-old was an active employee of the bank at the time of the shooting.
As of Tuesday afternoon, four victims were still being treated at University Hospital Louisville, three of them in stable condition.
The fourth patient was Officer Nickolas Wilt, one of the police responders who was shot in the head Monday morning as officers exchanged gunfire with the shooter. Wilt remains in critical condition.
Authorities also said they would soon release body camera footage from the shooting.
The shooting renews calls to action to combat gun violence
in Tuesday press conferenceSeveral officials made emotional pleas to state and federal lawmakers to do more to combat the kind of deadly gun violence that struck Louisville on Monday.
“I am a person of faith. I grew up in the church. We raised our children in the church. Please, if you are a person of faith, and you would like to give us thoughts and Your prayers we want and we need them,” said Representative Morgan McGarvey, D-Ky.
“But we need policies to prevent this from happening again, so thoughts and prayers don’t have to be for another community torn apart by barbaric gun violence.” he added.
Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg called the level of gun violence “horrific” and said 40 people have been shot dead in Louisville this year. “It’s beyond anything we can and will accept in our community,” he said.
Greenberg urged lawmakers at the state Capitol in Frankfort as well as members of Congress in Washington, DC, to do more.
He also criticized a Kentucky law that he said would allow auction of the AR-15 rifle used in Monday’s shooting.
When asked how hospital staff are dealing with the influx of patients from the shootings, Jason Smith, medical director of the University of Louisville Health, said it’s not uncommon for emergency rooms to see so many The victim was shot in one day.
“To be honest with you, we barely had to adjust our operating room schedule to be able to do this,” he said. “That’s how often we have to deal with gun violence in our community.”
Smith said he was “tired” of seeing victims of gun violence at the hospital during the 15 years he worked there, and that it can be exhausting for medical professionals who… must notify families that their loved one has passed away.
“It breaks your heart. When you hear someone scream ‘mom’ or ‘daddy,’ it becomes too difficult day in and day out to do that,” he said.
“I don’t know what the answer is. But to all the people who help make policy – state, city, federal – I’m simply asking you to do something. Because don’t do it. nothing, that’s what we’re doing, not working.”
Russell Lewis contributed reporting.
