Atleast one person shot at the University Mall in Tuscaloosa, AL.

[bamacrat]

Source: Me

Im across the road.

No link yet.

---

I have been in my house hearing sirens for the last 15 minutes at least. I live across the road from the University Mall, and when I went outside the sirens were staying constant. I walked over to the Hardee's parking lot and saw cops and ambulances at the mall. There was a guy in the dumpster area talking to someone who just left the mall. He said one person was had been shot in the leg.

This has not been on any news yet, still happening.

[trashcanistanista]

1. Another holiday heartbreak.

Is this anywhere near Sumiton? I have relatives there. Stay safe.

[bamacrat]

4. I don't belive Sumiton is near here, never actually heard of it...

I moved to Tuscaloosa in the fall of 04 and it seems like it gets more violent every year. Still not a real scary to live, but.

[Syrinx]

12. not all that far away

Sumiton is northwest of Birmingham, I think, while Tuscaloosa about 55 miles southwest of Birmingham.

[gateley]

2. Any input as to whether it was a gunman "mowing people down" or an altercation

between a couple of people?

[bamacrat]

6. Not yet, don't really want to go over there, or follow the guy around.

Still waiting to see something on a news site.

[DS1]

3. heh

you should have done what they do in commercials


Up to 40 people shot at the University Mall in Tuscaloosa, AL.


:D

[bamacrat]

5. Peobably would have got a lot more replies..

Even better if the guy I talked to turned out to be the guy and we got into a gun fist battle and I won, because he had poor aim due to the incorrect way he held his gun. Hhaha

[Syrinx]

7. a teenage girl got in an argument with a woman at the food court

The girl pulled a handgun from her purse, and shot the woman in the leg. The girl appeared to be about 15.

At least that's what was reported on local news.

[rosepetal31]

8. God help today's youth...

What is wrong with our society that a 15 year old gets into an argument and resources to using a gun...?

[greiner3]

16. Sorry to rain on your parade;

However, what does an invisible and imaginary (I'm convinced that people treat this separately) being have to do with someone's actions? I would say that with the media promoting violence and the nra saying that everyone needs a gun is enough, on the face of it, to explain the outcome.

[Tesha]

21. Availability of firearms (to any idiot) has something to do with it.

But in ten seconds or so, some gun nutter will
be along to tell you how and why I'm wrong.

Tesha

[Pavulon]

22. Prohibition works..

see alcohol, drugs, and prostitution.. It would take how many calls for all to show up on your doorstep?

[Tesha]

24. That's right. Because outright prohibition wouldn't work, there's absolutely nothing we can do...

...to keep firearms out of the hands of every yahoo
in the country.

Or so say the gun nutters.

Tesha

[bamacrat]

10. Thanks for the update.

There were helicopters flying over with their spot lights on for about 2 hours after. I guess thats Tuscaloosa for you.

[Syrinx]

11. looks like some of the facts were wrong

Judging by the T'News story posted by Newsjock. I got my early info from WVUA, which is truly a shoestring operation, run mainly by students, I think.

I suppose the shooter may feel flattered that she was mistaken for a 15-year-old. ;)

I witnessed a shooting at McFarland Mall about 13 years ago. That was a scary experience -- people just stampeding for the exits. That was gang-related. It was back when they still had the movie theater at McFarland, and they were showing one of those gangsta movies.

Best wishes.

[Newsjock]

9. Link here

http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/article/20071222/LATEST/253667180/-1/NEWS03

Hundreds of holiday shoppers went running for cover, screaming and scared for their lives when a shot was fired at University Mall late Saturday night.

A 28-year-old woman allegedly pulled a handgun and shot Melissa Wilkins, 35, in the leg after the two got into a scuffle over a boyfriend in front of the Stitch Factory kiosk near the Victoria’s Secret and Foot Locker stores, said Tuscaloosa Police Chief Ken Swindle and several witnesses.

[JeanGrey]

13. And sadly it is probably over some guy you wouldn't take

to a worm wrestle!

[Syrinx]

14. what's that?

[and-justice-for-all]

15. What the hell?

Are people just going over the edge?

[nealmhughes]

17. If you only got to Tuscaloosa in 04 you missed the glory days of violence.

A crazed former student held his former girl friend and her new boyfriend hostage for twelve hours on Halloween 00 or 01, then ran naked down the street (Riverside Drive) to his apt. and fired out of the window for several hours. I had come back to my house on Riverside before the ruckus and was lying on the couch when thd dog went nuts: SWAT team assembling one house down with my house inside the perimeter!
Well, there were occasional shots from the apt., but then a lot of loudspeaker announcements; live coverage on TV -- nothing like seeing your house on TV for a disaster. End of story: he ran out of ammo, went outside and then shot a policeman in the shoulder and they took him down with a beanbag gun . . .
The previous year I lived on campus and a distraught grad student decided to commit suicide by setting his apt. on fire! The year before that the same thing happened, only across the street from my new house on Riverside.
2002 a fight broke out in a bar and a guy burst into an open apt. just down the street from the BP on University and the other guy chased himm inside, grabbing a knife from the frightened occupants and stabbed him to death. I just happened to be on my way to the BP one block from my house and saw the body being carried out and the blood still on the sidewalk.
2006: a fender bender on University just past Hackberry leads the guy whose car was bumped to get out and shoot the student who had the audacity to bump his car, he was a 17 year old and not even a student at UA, "just visiting."

I lived in Metro NY and never once had face-to-face encounters with violence, save when the crazed Riverhead mass murderer was on his rampage in Rhead an Southampton for a week, but I just went to my friend's apt. in Manhattan. I am convinced that there actually is something in the water in Tuscaloosa!

And some people want to arm faculty and students: as someone who had a close associate attacked by a disgruntled student and one to try to slap me when I caught her plagiarizing, no way. By the way, this ain't no dangerous innercity, it's the college town of college towns.

[happyslug]

18. The Rural South...

Prior to the 1960s every Major US City had below average murder rates do to the high rate on Murder in the Rural South. As Blacks moved into the Cities in the 1950s and 1960s this started to change, the number of Murders in the South DROPPED, do to the Drop in Population (The Murder Rate stayed about the same) while murder rates in Northern Cities increases as the Number of blacks increased. Then came a slow steady decline that continues to this day (An exception exists for the early 1990s but that did not last long, the decline resumed by 1995, it seems to have ended, but that again may be a temporary stop in the decline, only time will tell).

The theory is that the Blacks who moved North brought with them the cultural norms they were raised with, including the high crime and murder rates of the Rural South. Once in the North they slowly adopted more a Northern attitude to violence which lead to the slow but steady decline since the 1960s.

The RURAL south is know (and has been known for over 300 years, it predates the American Revolution) for violence. Studies have confirmed this. One Test about which I read several years ago had people put on sensors an the were told to walk down to the lab via a hallway. In the hallway was a person who then pumped into that person (and the sensors picked up HOW the person reacted to that contact). Men from the North just laughed off the contact and had very low stress caused by the hit, the opposite result from Rural Southerns, the level of Stress were HIGH. The point of the test was to help understand WHY the much higher rate of Violence in the Rural South

[QC]

19. I remember that incident.

And let's not forget the double murder at the apartments over on Hackberry. Or the guy stabbed to death right by the stadium.

[donsu]

20. wow, what exciting times for you - like a mini Baghdad

is violence contagious?

[nealmhughes]

23. Wanna hear the kicker: I'm seriously considering going back for my PhD there!

It is quite out of character for a smaller city to have so much violence, even in the South. I think the combo of culture from knowing where one fit in society to a mutli-cultural non-commuter environment may have something to do with it, I honestly don't know.

There is also a tremendous class conflict on campus at UA. . . more so than any other campus where I have ever been associated. That might have something to do with it too.

Nothing like walking the dog at night there and hear glass breaking behind you as a street brawl breaks out.

The state nervous hospital is there, too . . . might also have a bit of something to do with it too, plus the stench from the coke factory: it smells like scorched motor oil and only reaches the campus area by the River. How thoughtful of them. It is also a $150 fine for putting a couch on one's own porch for a ball game party. I know. And there is only one really good bar in town now that the Chukkar is shutdown, leaving only Egan's for the non-greek population. And no bloody ESB on tap any longer!

Maybe I'll go enjoy the proverbial joys of Bloomington instead.