3 dead, including suspected shooter, in Oregon grocery store attack

Three people, including the suspected shooter, are dead following an attack Sunday night at a grocery store in central Oregon, police said.

Officers were dispatched to the Safeway at the Forum Shopping Center shortly after 7 p.m. after receiving reports of shots fired, the Bend Police Department said in a statement.

Shooting rounds from an AR-15-style rifle, the gunman was believed to have begun the attack in the store's parking lot before moving inside, according to police.

Customer Glenn Edward Bennett, 84, was shot inside the entrance, police said Monday. Medics took that victim to a hospital, but the person was declared deceased, police said.

An employee, 66-year-old Donald Ray Surrett Jr., was fatally wounded while trying to disarm the shooter in the produce section, police said Monday.

"Surrett engaged with the shooter, attempted to disarm him and may very well have prevented further deaths," Bend police spokeswoman Sheila Miller said Monday. "Mr. Surrett acted heroically during this terrible incident."

Police on Monday identified the shooter as 20-year-old Ethan Blair Miller, who lived at a nearby apartment complex. He died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, leaving an AR-15-style rifle and a shotgun near his body, police said.

Police also found a sawed-off shotgun and three Molotov cocktails in his vehicle, along with additional ammunition and "digital devices."

"When our officers arrived, they could hear gunshots in the Safeway and they entered the store to confront the shooter while shots were still being fired," said the Bend police rep Miller, who is not related to the shooter.

Bend police did not end up firing any shots, she added.

Dexter Chamberlin said he was checking out at the Safeway when he heard gunfire.

“We started running out the back emergency exit telling other people to do the same,” he said. “We ran to a nearby apartment complex and hid behind some building with about a dozen other people.”

Speaking at a news conference Sunday night, Bend Police Chief Mike Krantz said police were working with a “very large crime scene” in the ongoing investigation into the attack.

He said police were doing everything they could to follow up on potential leads and were “aware of other information floating around on social media” about the suspected shooter. He also said police were aware of reports of other possible shootings in town, but had found no evidence of additional incidents.

“We know that this is a frightening thing for our community and something that we would never want to happen in our city,” he said.

Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., offered his condolences to the families of the victims in a tweet late Sunday as he called on Americans to "come together" to bring an end to gun violence in the U.S.

"My heart breaks for the families of the victims and the many people whose routine Sunday evening shopping turned into a terrifying run for their lives in Bend," Merkley said.

"This doesn’t have to happen. It’s not normal in any other country," he said. "High-powered assault rifles with high-capacity magazines, combined with personal grievances and often a culture of hate, create a toxic stew that leaves good people, innocent people dead, maimed, and traumatized."

"We need to come together — Democrats and Republicans, urban and rural, Black and white and brown and Asian American and Native American, and including the many responsible gun owners — and put an end to this madness," Merkley said.