Walmart reopens after police fatally shoot armed man threatening customers
A man waving guns and a machete inside an eastern Pennsylvania Walmart was shot and killed by police Saturday night.
“We’re thankful there were no injuries to customers and associates,” Walmart spokesman Randy Hargrove told the Pocono Record.
The East Stroudsburg, Pa., store reopened by noon Sunday, workers said.
According to witnesses, the gunman was wearing a bandanna over his face when walked into the store and began threatening and intimidating customers. Arriving police shot and killed the man, identified as Andrew Joseph Todd, 20, after he refused to drop his weapons, investigators said in an early morning press conference.
Officers tried resuscitate Todd, who was pronounced dead at the Pocono Medical Center by the county coroner. Police did not discuss a possible motive for Todd's actions.
Witnesses told reporters there were about 100 people in the store when Todd walked in. Shopper John Bruno said he initially thought the man he saw was holding a toy gun, just joking around, while yelling “Get the (expletive) out!”
“I could have touched him,” Bruno told the Record. “He was an arm’s length away. It was pretty terrifying now that I think about it.”
East Stroudsburg is about 75 miles west of New York City and about 100 miles north of Philadelphia.