Police search for motive after apparently 'random' shooting at Michigan recreation center leaves at least 9 injured

Police are searching for a motive after at least nine people were shot in what appears to be a 'random' shooting that sent panicked families fleeing a crowded recreation area in Rochester Hills, Michigan, on Saturday afternoon , authorities said.

A gunman stopped at the Brooklands Plaza Splash Pad, got out of a vehicle and opened fire about 20 feet away, reloading several times, Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard said. The suspect fired “potentially 28 times,” the sheriff said.

“In no way is it normal for ice cream cones and flip-flops to be littered with blood and bullet casings,” Michigan Rep. John James said at a news conference Saturday evening.

The suspect, a 42-year-old man who has not yet been named by authorities, was found with an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound in a nearby home after police traced the weapon from the shooting to at an address located 800 meters from the crime. scene, Bouchard said during a press conference Saturday evening.

The victims, including two young children and their mother, were shot and transported to four local hospitals with “different types of injuries,” according to Bouchard.

“When I got there, I started crying,” Rochester Hills Mayor Bryan Barnett said Saturday evening. “Because I know what a paddling pool is supposed to be.” It's supposed to be a place where people gather, where families create memories, where people have fun and enjoy a Saturday afternoon, which wasn't the case today.

An 8-year-old boy is in critical condition after being shot in the head and his 4-year-old brother was shot in the thigh and is in stable condition, Bouchard said. Their 39-year-old mother, injured in the abdomen and leg, was also in critical condition.

Six other shooting victims, including three women and three men aged 30 to 78, were in stable condition Saturday evening.

The incident appears to be “random” in that the suspect has “no connection to the victims” and authorities have not yet determined the motivation for the attack, the sheriff said.

The suspect also had no criminal history, Bouchard said.

“We will be looking for any evidence … that would give us an idea of ​​what might be motivating this individual before this terrible moment,” Bouchard said.

Officials say the shooting comes at a time when the community was still recovering from two mass shootings in the state in recent years. In February 2023, a gunman killed three Michigan State University students and seriously injured five others. A few years earlier, a teenager killed four students at a high school in Oxford, Michigan in 2021.

“We don't even fully understand what happened in Oxford, and now we're faced with another total tragedy that we're dealing with,” Bouchard said.

The shooting adds to the list of approximately 220 mass shootings that have occurred across the country so far this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive. The archives, like CNN, define a mass shooting as one in which at least four people are shot, excluding the shooter.

How the shooting happened at a crowded paddling pool

Bouchard said the shooter arrived at the spray area and opened fire with a Glock 9mm handgun.

“It looked chaotic. You could see people just enjoying the day, and then it was a stampede,” Bouchard said, referring to the video of the shooting. “People were falling, getting hit, trying to run. »

Detectives discovered 28 shell casings at the scene, according to a news release from the sheriff's office.

“He began shooting once he got out of his car from the bottom of the steps, climbed the steps, reloaded, then fired from the top of the steps into the area of ​​the water jets before leaving and appeared to drive off without warning. rushing, just calmly returned to his car,” Bouchard said, citing evidence from the scene.

The first 911 call alerting police to the incident was made around 5:11 p.m. Bouchard said a Rochester Hills sergeant responded to the scene within two minutes – before the call was dispatched. By then, the suspect had already fled the scene, according to Bouchard.

Authorities located a Glock 9-millimeter semi-automatic handgun and three empty magazines at the scene, the sheriff said at a news conference Saturday.

Suspect found dead after police raid home

After the shooting, police traced the gun found at the scene to a nearby home, where they found a vehicle matching the description of the one that had driven away from the scene of the shooting, according to the sheriff.

The home, located a half-mile from the crime scene, was surrounded by officers, SWAT teams and armored vehicles, the sheriff said.

The suspect was not known to authorities until they conducted a “rapid investigation” and determined who they believed was involved based on evidence collected at the crime scene.

Police contained the house within 45 minutes to an hour, according to Bouchard. There was “a recognition that we were there and that we had heard or seen it,” Bouchard said.

After attempting to contact the suspect, law enforcement “entered the home and deployed drones to begin an inspection of the home,” and located the suspect deceased, Bouchard said at a news conference Saturday night.

Investigators believed there were potentially more weapons in the home, but it was unclear if the suspect had access to them, according to Bouchard. Authorities said Saturday they were working to obtain a search warrant for the home where the suspect was located.

Police later found a handgun next to the deceased suspect inside the home. A drone that flew over the house as police surrounded it also found what appeared to be an “AR platform” firearm on the kitchen table, Bouchard said Saturday evening.

“It wouldn't surprise me — because having this on the kitchen table is not an everyday activity — that there would probably be something else, potentially a second chapter,” Bouchard said.

Police said the investigation was ongoing as they worked to “determine if there is a digital or written record that would give us some insight” and piece together a timeline of how the shooting unfolded. Whether or not the suspect posted relevant information on social media or had anything on his devices will also be part of the investigation, officials said.

“It will be one of those challenges to try to understand why there seems to be no connection between the victims and the location. Nobody lives in Rochester Hills. He went to a park in Rochester Hills,” Bouchard said.

Authorities also recovered video evidence from a nearby camera and are searching for bullet fragments, Bouchard said.

Community still reeling from Oxford shooting

The sheriff called the incident “a gut punch” and stressed that the community was still reeling from the 2021 shooting at a high school in Oxford, just 15 miles north of Rochester Hills.

“None of us in this room, in this community or in this country, expected that Father’s Day weekend would be met with this kind of tragedy, which will profoundly affect families forever” , Bouchard said during a press conference Saturday evening.

Governor Gretchen Whitmer said in a statement on X that she was in contact with local authorities following the shooting.

“I am heartbroken to learn of the shooting in Rochester Hills,” she wrote. “We are monitoring the situation as updates continue to come in and are in contact with local authorities.”

CNN's Emma Tucker contributed to this report.

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