NYPD officers are searching for an attacker who opened fired in gun-free Times Square around 7 p.m. Thursday night.
ABC News reported that the suspect first shot at a security guard in JD Sports, after the guard stopped he and two others for suspicion of shoplifting.
The shot missed the guard and hit a tourist from Brazil, wounding her in the leg.
Medics remove an injured woman after a shooting inside the JD Sports store on Broadway and 41st Street in Times Square, Manhattan, New York City on Thursday, February 8, 2024. (Gardiner Anderson for NY Daily News via Getty Images)
The suspect then fled the store, but fired two more shots at an officer who was pursuing him.
The Daily Mail noted that NYPD Chief of Patrol John Chell pointed out that the officer at whom the suspect fired did not return fire because there were too people around and he did not want to hit an untended target.
The suspect escaped via the 49th Street subway station. He is described as a Hispanic male.
Police respond after a woman was shot inside the JD Sports store on Broadway and 41st Street in Times Square, Manhattan, New York City on Thursday, February 8, 2024. (Gardiner Anderson for NY Daily News via Getty Images)
Mike Bloomberg-affiliated Everytown for Gun Safety ranks New York the No. 2 state in the Union for gun control laws, describing the state an “innovator” on gun control.
New York has an “assault weapons” ban, a “high capacity” magazine ban, universal background checks, a red flag law, gun storage requirements, “ghost gun” regulations, a microstamping requirement for new handguns, a ban on being armed on colllege or on K-12 campuses for self-defense or classroom defense, and stringent open carry regulations, among other controls.
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio, a Turning Point USA Ambassador, and a pro-staffer for Pulsar Night Vision. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal in 2010 and holds a Ph.D. in Military History, with a focus on the Vietnam War (brown water navy), U.S. Navy since Inception, the Civil War, and Early Modern Europe. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.