On May 6, a gunman opened fire at a mall north of Dallas, killing at least eight people and injuring seven others. The shooting occurred outside the Allen Premium

Outlets mall in Allen, Texas, and the motive of the shooter is currently unknown. Authorities believe that the shooter acted alone and was killed by a police officer.

According to Jon Boyd, the chief of the Allen fire department, at least nine people were taken to area hospitals, and two of them died at the hospital. Three victims were in critical condition, while four others were stable. Medical City Healthcare, which operates 16 hospitals in the area, said that its trauma centers were treating eight of the wounded victims, ranging in age from 5 to 61.

In a separate incident, police in the nearby city of Frisco, Texas, evacuated the Stonebriar mall after receiving reports of shots fired. However, it is unclear if a shooting had taken place there.

Eyewitnesses reported seeing the gunman walking down the sidewalk and shooting his gun outside the mall. Images from TV aerials showed hundreds of people calmly leaving the mall, many with their hands up, as police guarded the area.

The shooting is another tragic incident in the United States, where mass shootings have become commonplace. According to the Gun Violence Archive, there have been at least 198 mass shootings in the country so far in 2023, making it the most at this point in the year since at least 2016. Texas Governor Greg Abbott called the shooting an "unspeakable tragedy" and said that the state was prepared to offer any assistance local authorities may need. Photo by Ken Lund from Reno, Nevada, USA, Wikimedia commons.