(Trenton) A 26-year-old man, suspected of killing three members of his family on Saturday morning, took refuge in a house surrounded by police in the northeast of the United States.
At the beginning of the afternoon, the suspect was still holed up in this house in Trenton, “where the residents were able to be evacuated without being injured”, indicated the police of this capital of New Jersey, in a message sent to the AFP.
American televisions showed images of members of the police helping people to leave the upper floor of the house. Rapid intervention forces from several federal police services were deployed to the scene.
The “SWAT”, special intervention service, “attempts to negotiate a peaceful surrender”, indicated the Trenton police.
Andre Gordon Jr, presented as homeless by the authorities, who released his photo, is suspected of a murderous spree in the morning in Levittown, in the great suburbs of Philadelphia, in the neighboring state of Pennsylvania, where he killed three members of his family in two different places.
PHOTO JOE LAMBERTI, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Police officers guard the crime scene in suburban Philadelphia.
In a first residence, the suspect, armed with an AR-15 assault rifle, “targeted and killed his 52-year-old mother-in-law” and “his 13-year-old sister”, while three other people were hiding, said Bucks County, Pennsylvania prosecutor Jen Schorn during a press briefing.
Armed robbery
He then “broke into” a second residence “where he targeted and killed” a 25-year-old woman “with whom he had two children,” she said. The prosecutor added that he injured an additional victim by hitting her with his assault rifle.
The suspect then committed an armed robbery of a vehicle and fled the scene.
Authorities in Falls Township, where Levittown is located, asked people to stay at home on Saturday before lifting this order once the suspect was located in New Jersey.
The police and the courts have not given any information on the suspect’s motivations.
The event is added to the long list of tragedies involving firearms in the United States, which pay a very heavy price for their spread across the country and the ease with which Americans have access to them.
The country has more individual weapons than inhabitants: one in three adults owns at least one weapon and almost one in two adults lives in a home where there is a weapon.
Around 49,000 people died by gunfire in 2021, more than half of which were suicides, compared to 45,000 in 2020, figures without comparison with those of other developed countries.