Quiet Sunday Afternoon at Upscale Mall Turns Deadly

Multiple deaths and injuries are being reported by Sgt. Tony Sanders, who is with the Media Relations Department of the Kansas City, Missouri Police Department, in a shooting that occurred Sunday afternoon at the Ward Parkway Shopping Center. A gunman is alleged to have gone to the mall following a shooting incident at another location which involved a Kansas City, Missouri police officer. Once at the mall, he is alleged to have shot individuals in the mall parking lot, and then continued on into the mall with a long gun and shot several others within the mall.

At last report, two people were dead in the parking lot, the shooter had been shot and killed by police within the mall, and several other shoppers were shot and wounded. There was some confusion as to the number and extend of the injuries because it appeared some of those injured had been taken to the hospital before emergency medical assistance arrived.

Ward Parkway Mall is located in one of the most affluent areas of Kansas City, and the west side of the mall is on a street called State Line, which divides Missouri and Kansas. The mall is located on the Missouri side. It is said to have been completely evacuated. It houses numbers stores and is also the site of one of the city's most popular movie complexes. Theater goers reported that they were told to evacuate in the midst of the movies they were watching.

Initial reports indicate that the suspected shooter was stopped for questioning at a located in Missouri east of the mall by police in relation to another homicide investigation. An office was alleged to have been shot by that suspect in the arm, at which time the suspect fled. The office called a description of the shooter and his vehicle to other officers, and then the officer was taken to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries. Shortly thereafter, per Sgt. Sanders, reports began to come in to police of shootings at Ward Parkway Shopping Center.

An incident of this nature in this location definitely comes as a shock to Kansas City residents. Less than a mile from the mall both the thoroughfares of Ward Parkway and State Line are lined with million dollar homes and mansions. One of the nation's most prestigious zip codes and also its reported highest incomes surround the mall.

Although, like most indoor shopping centers in the country, Ward Parkway Mall has seen a definite decline in its popularity and income, it has recently gone through major renovations that appear to have generated new life there. Changes in the demographics of both shoppers and the stores within the mall have also resulted in varying traffic patterns differences as well.