Orlando shooting – live: Suspect pretended to be asleep during police interview, sheriff says
Shooter returned to scene and killed Spectrum News 13 reporter covering earlier homicide as well as young girl before being taken into custody
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A 19-year-old gunman accused of killing a nine-year-old girl and a local journalist reporting on his earlier homicide in Orlando, Florida, on Wednesday had a “lengthy” criminal record, local authorities have said.
A 20-year-old woman had been shot dead earlier on Wednesday, prompting a crew from a local news channel reaching the spot in the Pine Hills area to cover the incident on the same day, where a journalist and a videographer was shot when the suspect returned to the scene.
Sheriff John Mina said during a press conference on Thursday that the suspect Keith Melvin Moses pretended to be asleep during an interview with police.
He added that he was taken to hospital after saying that he was unable to breathe. There, he fought with medical staff and had to be restrained. He then also become physical with detectives and had to be restrained again, the sheriff said.
Sheriff Mina said it was a “random act of violence” and that the Sheriff’s office is still working to establish why the shooting take place.
“This was not gang-related,” he added.
Everything we know about the Florida shooting that left journalist and nine-year-old girl dead
Journalist killed in Orlando shooting identified as Spectrum News reporter Dylan Lyons
Florida TV reporter killed while covering a fatal shooting
TV journalist breaks down on camera reporting on death of fellow reporter in Orlando mass shooting- Orlando shooting: TV journalist shot dead while reporting from scene of murder
40 journalists killed around the world last year, one in the US
Worldwide, 40 journalists were reported killed last year, plus another two this year before Wednesday, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. One of those was in the U.S.
Jeff German, who covered politics and corruption for the Las Vegas Review-Journal, was found dead outside his home in September after being stabbed multiple times. Former Clark County Public Administrator Robert Telles, who had been a frequent subject of German’s reporting, has pleaded not guilty to a murder charge.
In 2015, Virginia reporter Alison Parker and cameraman Adam Ward were shot and killed during their live TV broadcast for CBS affiliate WDBJ7. The gunman, a former reporter for the TV station, killed himself hours later.
Everything we know about the Florida shooting that left journalist and nine-year-old girl dead
A 19-year-old gunman has been charged with first-degree murder in Orlando, Florida, after a shooting spree on Wednesday afternoon in which a TV journalist and a nine-year-old girl were killed following the earlier murder of a woman in the same location.
Tributes have since been paid to the reporter and a colleague who sustained critical injuries in the incident, as the city reels from another shocking explosion of gun violence.
Here is everything we know so far about the tragedy:
Everything we know about the Orlando gunman
A 19-year-old suspect has been charged with first-degree murder in Orlando, Florida, after an outbreak of gun violence on Wednesday that left three people dead and two more in a critical condition in hospital.
Police were called to Hialeah Drive in the Pine Hills neighbourhood of the city at around 11am on Wednesday morning after a woman in her 20s was found shot dead in her vehicle.
That afternoon, a news crew from local station Spectrum News 13 arrived to record a report on the incident. The gunman returned to the scene at around 4.05pm and fired into the team’s unmarked van, killing a reporter and severely injuring a photographer.
The shooter then fled, entering a nearby house on Harrington Street and opened fire on the occupants, injuring a mother and killing her daughter, aged just nine.
Read more:
Everything we know about the Orlando gunman
Suspect Keith Melvin Moses, 19, is facing one first-degree murder charge and expected to be charged over the shooting of four other victims
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