Suspect captured in shooting at July 4 parade in Chicago
Law enforcement officers gather at the scene of the Fourth of July parade shooting in Highland Park, Illinois, on July 4.
Police announced they had captured a suspect in a shooting on Monday that killed six people and wounded more than 36 when a man with a high-powered rifle opened fire from a rooftop at a Fourth of July parade in the Chicago suburb of Highland Park.
Police confirmed they captured 22-year-old Robert E. Crimo III, who was from the area.
Police can be seen surrounding a car and then Crimo exiting the vehicle with his hands raised, according to a video by the Chicago affiliate of ABC News. Crimo lies flat on the ground before police take him into custody.
Charges will be filed, Highland Park Police said.
The shooting caused toddlers to abandon tricycles and parents to run for safety with their children, turning a civic display of patriotism into a scene of panicked mayhem.
"It sounded like fireworks going off," said retired doctor Richard Kaufman who was standing across the street from where the gunman opened fire, adding that he heard about 200 shots.
"It was pandemonium. A stampede. Babies were flying in the air. People were diving for cover," he said. "People were covered in blood tripping over each other."
Police did not have a motive for the shooting.
More than 36 people were hurt, mostly by gunshots, said Jim Anthony, a spokesman for the NorthShore University HealthSystem. The 26 victims taken to the Highland Park hospital ranged in age from 8 to 85, said Brigham Temple, an emergency room doctor.
The New York Times named one of the dead as 76-year-old Nicolas Toledo, who was in a wheelchair and had not wanted to attend the parade, but his disabilities required that he be around someone full time and his family had not wanted to miss the event.
"We were all in shock," his granddaughter Xochil Toledo said. "We thought it was part of the parade."
At least one of those killed was a Mexican national, a senior Mexican Foreign Ministry official said on Twitter.
The shooting comes with gun violence fresh on the minds of many Americans after a massacre on May 24 killed 19 school children and two teachers at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, which followed a May 14 attack that killed 10 people at a grocery store in Buffalo, New York.
Children waving American flags, riding tricycles or enjoying a ride in a wagon pulled by adults froze as people in the crowd screamed while gunshots rang out, video on social media showed.
The Lake County Sheriff's Office posted an online wanted poster of Crimo, showing a thin-faced bearded man with facial and neck tattoos.
Police said the shooting took place from the rooftop of a business that the gunman reached via an alley ladder attached to the building that was not secure.
President Joe Biden said he and his wife Jill were "shocked by the senseless gun violence that has yet again brought grief to an American community on this Independence Day."
Biden said he had "surged federal law enforcement to assist in the urgent search for the shooter."
In his statement, Biden referred to bipartisan gun-reform legislation he signed recently but said much more needed to be done and added: "I'm not going to give up fighting the epidemic of gun violence."
Highland Park's population is 30,000 and nearly 90 percent white, according to the US Census Bureau. About a third of the population is Jewish, according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
The shooting is likely to rekindle the American debate about gun control, and whether stricter measures can prevent mass shootings that happen so frequently in the United States.
