Maine’s commissioner for public safety, Mike Sauschuck, gives the first update on the mass shooting at a bowling alley and a restaurant in Lewiston Wednesday night.
The gunman seen on chilling surveillance images from the deadly mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine, on Wednesday evening was prepared to kill, experts told NBC10 Boston.
There was a massive search underway for the shooter — no suspect has been publicly identified, though police were looking for a person of interest, Robert Card, who was considered armed and dangerous. Authorities haven't yet shared publicly how many people died in the shootings at the bowling alley Sparetime Recreation and restaurant Schemengees Bar and Grille, but law enforcement sources told NBC News it's believed to be between 15 and 20, with another 50 injured.
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The person seen in the surveillance video that was shared by police appears to have an AR-style semiautomatic rifle with a scope and tactical light mounted on it and multiple 30-round magazines, said Scott Sweetow, who helped lead the FBI's Terrorist Explosive Device Analytical Center, in an interview.
"He's kitted out to kill people," Sweetow told NBC10 Boston.
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Former Boston Police Commissioner Ed Davis, who led the department during the hunt for the Boston Marathon bombers, had the same impression.
"You have someone who has a long rifle and and is intent on using it," he said.
The way the person can be seen handling the rifle shows he knows "exactly where it needs to be to fire an accurate shot," Davis said, adding, "he's looking over the sights as he walked in the front door of that bowling alley. He was ready to kill."
Davis saw similarities between how people in Maine were complying with the shelter-in-place order and how Bostonians did during the marathon bombing 10 years ago.
"Frankly, I was surprised at how how much people cooperated with us during that particular event. And I can see the same dynamic occurring in Lewiston tonight," he said in an interview late Wednesday.
Sweetow and Todd McGhee, a retired Massachusetts State Police trooper who specializes in security analysis, shared Davis' view that the shelter-in-place is important both for public safety and for catching the shooter.
"We have a dangerous, armed individual at large and best for community members, both residents as well as businesses, to shut down, lock down, stay put inside of their homes in order for law enforcement to be able to have some level of agility to be able to follow leads," McGhee said.
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What made Wednesday's shooting uncommon is the fact that it took place at different locations — the bowling alley and restaurant are about four miles apart — and that the gunman was at large.
"The CCTV footage that's been captured and identifying this perpetrator may help investigators identify this person," giving them an image to compare against driver's licenses in the DMV, McGhee said.
Sweetow, a former top Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives official, said that the bullet casings at the scene will also help track "whether that firearm has been used before."
Authorities have yet to directly connect Card with the gunman. At a preliminary news conference Wednesday night, Mike Sauschuck, commissioner of the Maine Department of Public Safety, insisted that Card, while considered armed and dangerous, was not being treated a suspect in the shooting at the time.
