DAYTON, Ohio — Nineteen hours after a masked gunman opened fire on revelers enjoying summer nightlife, the blood had been scrubbed from the sidewalk and the crime-scene tape torn down as a somber crowd of hundreds stood in the same street Sunday evening to honor the nine victims killed and 27 left injured in Dayton, Ohio.
They released doves, repeated the names of the dead and sang “Amazing Grace,” but directed an angrier chorus at Republican Gov. Mike DeWine, interrupting his speech at the vigil with chants of “Make a change” and “Do something!”
Mayor Nan Whaley, a Democrat, said there will be time later for dealing with the policy issues. She implored the crowd to honor the victims of the second U.S. mass shooting in less than 24 hours, for which no motive has been explained.
Connor Betts, 24, was armed with a .223-caliber rifle with magazines capable of holding at least 100 rounds of ammunition when he fired off dozens of shots in a popular entertainment district, Police Chief Richard Biehl said.
Betts was gunned down within 30 seconds of the start of his rampage, police said. Surveillance video they shared shows officers shot Betts at the doorstep of further destruction, just stopping him from entering a bar where some people took cover when the chaos broke out around 1 a.m. Sunday in the historic Oregon District.
Had he gotten inside Ned Peppers Bar, the result would have been “catastrophic,” Biehl said.
Bullet holes remained visible in the window there as people left flower bouquets in memorial in front of Ned Peppers and other bars. At one store, a few purple flowers were tucked into a bullet hole.
Betts’ 22-year-old sister Megan was the youngest of the victims. Police identified the others as Monica Brickhouse, 39; Nicholas Cumer, 25; Derrick Fudge, 57; Thomas McNichols, 25; Lois Oglesby, 27; Saeed Saleh, 38; Logan Turner, 30; and Beatrice N. Warren-Curtis, 36.
The gunman was white and six of the nine killed were black, police said. Although they’ll investigate the possibility of a hate crime, they said the quickness of the rampage made any discrimination in the shooting seem unlikely.
Officials said 27 more people were treated for gunshots or other injuries suffered while fleeing, and at least 15 of those have been released. Several more were in serious or critical condition, hospital officials said.
Nikita Papillon, 23, was across the street at Newcom’s Tavern when the shooting started. She said she saw a girl she had talked to earlier lying outside Ned Peppers, a bar she described as the kind of place “where you don’t have to worry about someone shooting up the place.”
“People my age, we don’t think something like this is going to happen,” Papillon said. “And when it happens, words can’t describe it.”
President Donald Trump was briefed on the shooting and praised law enforcement’s speedy response in a tweet Sunday.
The FBI is assisting with the investigation as authorities put Betts’ life under the microscope in search of answers.