Police have said that the reason behind the attack remains a mystery. (agent)
Los Angeles:
The young coder credited with disarming the 72-year-old suspect in a mass shooting during Lunar New Year celebrations in California has described his “preliminary” battle with the gunman.
The man, identified by the New York Times as 26-year-old Brandon Tse, was in the office of the Lai Lai Ballroom & Studio in the Alhambra on Saturday night when he saw the suspect point a gun at him.
“My heart sank, I knew I was going to die,” he told the newspaper.
“At that moment, it was primal instinct,” he said. “Something happened there. I don’t know what came over me.”
He lunged at the man and grabbed the barrel of the gun, starting the fight for his life.
Mr. Tse, whose grandparents founded the ballroom, did not know that the suspect, identified by police as Huu Can Tran, was believed to have committed suicide just minutes earlier at a nearby Monterey Park. At another dance hall, 10 people were killed and 10 others were injured.
He said he had never seen the gun in real life — but it was clear the gunman was there not to rob, but to kill.
Tse told the Times, “He was looking for people by their body language, their facial expressions, their eyes.”
Mr Tse and his family said security footage showed the pair struggling for about 90 seconds before the gun was seized from the suspect.
He immediately pointed it back at her and shouted “Get out of here,” he told the paper.
The suspect fled. As police were moving in to arrest him on Sunday afternoon, he died hours later of shooting himself in a white van in Torrance, several miles to the south.
The gunman killed five men and five women, all in their 50s or 60s, in Monterey Park on Saturday night.
Police have said the motive behind the attack, which came as Asian communities around the world celebrated the Lunar New Year holiday, remains a mystery.
He said he believed the gunman intended to carry out a similar massacre at the Alhambra, and credited those who disarmed him with saving his life.
Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna has said two men disarmed the suspect at the Alhambra – but Mr Tse and his family, who still run the ballroom, say video footage shows he was alone. Battling the killer.
Mr Tse’s older sister Brenda, who runs the business, said the footage showed the gunman struggling fiercely to keep control of his weapon.
“He kept coming at it,” she told the Times. “He really wanted the gun back.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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