Apr 29, 2007 5:12 pm US/Pacific
(CBS) KANSAS CITY, Mo. A gunman shot a police officer, then opened fire in a parking lot and a mall Sunday, authorities said. By the time the violence was over, he and two other people were dead.
The man was shot to death inside Ward Parkway Center in south Kansas City, police spokesman Tony Sanders said. Police fired shots, but it was not immediately clear if he was killed by authorities.
Authorities said the violence began early Sunday afternoon, when they went to a home to check on a woman relatives hadn't seen for days. The victim was found dead and his car missing, Sanders said.
The car was spotted later in the day by an officer, who pulled the driver over and was shot in the arm, police said. The officer, whose wound was not life-threatening, returned fire.
The car took off and was seen later at the shopping center. Police said the man fatally shot two people in the parking lot. Then, he went inside the mall and fired more shots, wounding at least two others, Sanders said.
Target employee Caffie Bradshaw, 19, said she was in a break room with two other people when they heard shots. She said co-workers saw a white man with a rifle who was "spraying bullets."
Aaron Washington, 34, a Target employee, said the shooting appeared to happen near the store's entrance into the mall. He said he was coming back from lunch when he heard gunshots, and saw one man holding his eye.
"The man had apparently been shot," Washington said.
The mall, one of the city's busiest shopping centers, was shut down and officers were going through each store. The victims' names were not immediately released, and conditions on the wounded were not immediately available.
Ward Parkway Shopping Center is located about nine miles south of downtown Kansas City.
Ward Parkway, split by Brush Creek in the Country Club Plaza near its eastern terminus

A gunman killed three people and wounded two others Sunday after a shooting occurred at the Ward Parkway shopping center in Kansas City, Missouri. The shooting took place at around 4 p.m. local time (2200 UTC). The gunman fired shots from the parking lot, then entered the mall and continued shooting. He himself was then shot, presumably by local police.