A suspect in three fatal shootings in the Washington D.C. area was arrested Friday afternoon, according to police. The three fatal shootings were outside a school, a mall and a supermarket in Montgomery County, Maryland, last week.
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Officers responded to the shooting around 11:25 A.M Friday morning at the Westfield Montgomery Mall in Bethesda, Maryland.
The suspect has been identified as Eulalio Tordil, an employee of the Federal Protective Service. He was taken into custody near the supermarket, police said. According to the Washington Post, Tordil was reassigned and put onto administrative duties in light of a protective order between he and his wife after Tordil threatened to hurt his wife if she left him.
The order stated that Tordil was forcing his children to take part in “intense-military-like discipline.”
Authorities say that on Thursday afternoon, Tordil was also involved in a shooting at High Point High School. Tordil confronted his wife at the high school while she was waiting in the parking lot. After seeing the confrontation, a man approached Tordil but was shot. Tordil then turned to his 44 year old wife and shot her multiple times causing her death. The injured man was taken to the hospital but had no life-threatening injuries.
On Friday morning, 15 miles from the school, Tordil approached a woman sitting in her car and shot her in the shoulder. One witness told WRC that the attack “seemed like an ambush.” Two male victims then tried to intervene but were shot. One man was killed and the other is in critical condition. Montgomery County Police Assistant Chief Darryl McSwain said there was no reason to believe the victims knew the shooter.
About 45 minutes later at a Giant Food Store in Aspen Hill, which is roughly five miles away, another woman was shot and killed, according to police. Tordil was later arrested around 3 P.M and taken into custody near the grocery store.
All Montgomery County schools were put on alert by police and told to shelter in place until Tordil was arrested.
A car matching the description that police were looking for was found in the center of the grocery store parking lot.
Shootings UPDATE: Suspect IN CUSTODY in Aspen Hill area: Eulalio Tordil, 62. Press Conference to be held. Time: TBD pic.twitter.com/cHQJRPa9uP
— Montgomery Co Police (@mcpnews) May 6, 2016
LIVE on #Periscope: Press Conference- Shootings https://t.co/uly3BaO5vF
— Montgomery Co Police (@mcpnews) May 6, 2016
Soon after, John Allen Muhammed, a Washington D.C. sniper, shot into a Michael’s Craft Store that is only a few hundred feet from the grocery store in Aspen Hill. Less than an hour later, he killed a man a mile away from the store.
Authorities believe that the motive behind the second and third shootings may have been carjacking.
