A woman walked into a Key Peninsula grocery store and began shooting a handgun Saturday, injuring three men before another customer tackled her, police say.
Deputies were called about 12:45 p.m. to the Peninsula Market at 14220 92nd Ave. in Wauna.
Witnesses said the 20-year-old woman entered the store and walked around briefly before she began firing, Pierce County Sheriff Paul Pastor said.
A man in his 70s was hit in the leg, and a man in his 30s in his midsection.
A 20-year-old male cashier suffered a minor leg injury from a ricocheting bullet.
People in the store “got her down and literally sat on her until we arrived,” Pastor said.
Pharmacist Ian Warren at the business next door went to help when he heard about the shooting. The midsection wound seemed life-threatening, he said, but the victims’ official conditions were not known.
The two customers were taken to the hospital, and the cashier drove himself to get treatment, according to the Sheriff’s Department.
There was “blood all over the place,” said Warren, who lives in University Place.
He has worked next door to the market for 14 years and described its location as “a rural kind of area. Very calm. Very friendly. Very community-oriented. Many people who have been coming to this shopping center have been coming here for years.”
Warren said he recognized the older man who was shot as a regular customer at the center.
“This is my supermarket,” said Diana McGhee, who found the store closed while police investigated Saturday. “It could have been anyone.”
Deputies arrested the alleged shooter. Pastor said there is no indication that she knew the victims.
Sheriff's spokesman Ed Troyer said the woman told law enforcement she “didn’t like [the two people shot].”
“This is a very calm place, no history of shooting,” Pastor said. “This is unique and shocking to people in the community that this kind of thing could take place.”
alexis.krell@thenewstribune.com
253-597-8268
blog.thenewstribune.com/crime
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