The violence began after the suspect, identified as Arthur DaRosa, 28, crashed his vehicle into a truck around 7:00 pm (2300 GMT) in Taunton, south of Boston, around 4 miles (6 kilometers) from the mall, Bristol District Attorney Thomas Quinn III told reporters.
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Three people at Macy’s were also injured during the incident, according to the Plymouth County District Attorney’s Office.
Mayor Thomas Hoye, Jr., right, speaks about Tuesday’s stabbings at a Taunton home and shopping mall, Wednesday, May 11, 2016, in Fall River, Mass. Quinn said detectives are still interviewing “scores of witnesses and surviving victims”, and he declined to answer most reporters’ questions about the assailant’s background or what may have triggered him.
According police, a suspect later identified as Arthur DaRosa first crashed his auto outside a Taunton home on Tuesday. “It’s just a senseless tragedy”.
“We will do our own forensic investigation through our own police department as well to make sure our community is being properly served”, Hoye said.
Investigators are looking into Arthur DaRosa’s short stay at Morton Hospital.
“This appears to be an irrational series of actions but we’re going to continue to investigate”, Quinn said.
The stabbings began Tuesday evening after DaRosa suddenly left his daughter’s soccer practice.
Patricia Slavin, 80, one of the victims from the attack at a house, also died.
The women, who didn’t identify themselves on camera, said DaRosa went Monday to a hospital by ambulance but was discharged the next morning without being treated.
From there he ran into a Bertucci’s restaurant. The station reported that people in the area, about 40 miles (64 km) south of Boston, saw police officers with guns drawn and that the mall had been evacuated and put on lockdown.
George Heath, a visual design teacher at the Greater New Bedford Regional Vocational Technical High School, was at the bar at Bertucci’s with his wife, Rosemary Heath. Heath was later transported to Morton Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 8:07 p.m. She says he has recently been suicidal, and the “devil was playing tricks on him”.
“If they have a psychotic illness, people who are using substances, who are intoxicated and people with a past history of violence”, said Anfang.
Arthur DaRosa, 28, of Taunton, was killed by an off-duty sheriff’s deputy after he failed to obey orders to drop his knife after stabbing a man at a restaurant, authorities said. DaRosa didn’t comply with the order, was shot once in the abdomen and died, according to authorities. His family blames the hospital in Taunton for his deadly rampage. Deputy Creed was able to engage (DaRosa) and prevent further injuries or death to other patrons.
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“I feel so sorry for those families and what happened, but he’s not completely to blame, he was sick”, she added.
