Saina Fa’atoafe, 29, fatally shot an adult female in the parking lot of a Walmart in Alaska, while a gunman opened fire at a store in Ohio, injuring four before taking his own life.
Walmart stores in Alaska and Ohio were both sites of gun violence this week, with a murder-suicide and mass shooting occurring at two of the retail giant's stores in a span of less 24 hours.
In Alaska, Saina Fa’atoafe, 29, fatally shot an adult female in the parking lot of a Walmart at a popular shopping center before taking his own life, the Anchorage Police Department (APD) said in a statement.
The identity of the female is not being revealed by police because the incident is currently classified as a domestic-violence crime, said police.
Walmart confirmed the details of the murder-suicide in a statement and said that one of the individuals involved in the shooting worked at the store and had been on their break at the time. They declined to provide any further details on that person's identity.
Officers arrived on the scene of the shooting Sunday evening to find a deceased female and male as well as a firearm, according to the APD.
From the start of the investigation, the APD said that the shooting appeared to be an isolated incident.
On Tuesday, the APD released an updated statement to say that officers completed their investigation into the shooting and determined it to be a murder-suicide.
Less than 24 hours after that murder-suicide, 20-year-old Benjamin Charles Jones walked into a Walmart store and opened fire at a store in Ohio, according to the Beavercreek Police Department (BPD).
Jones armed himself with a Hi-Point .45-caliber carbine long gun, said police, and injured three woman and one man at the store in the Dayton suburb of Beavercreek before taking his own life. Three of those individuals are in stable condition while one is in critical condition as of Tuesday, said the BPD in a statement.
The identities of those shot by the gunman are being withheld at this time because police have not yet ruled out the possibility of this being a racially motivated attack.
Anyone with information of Jones is encouraged to contact the FBI.
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