Officials believe the 72-year-old shooter hadn’t been inside the dance hall for at least five years before the attack.
— The 72-year-old gunman who sprayed bullets into a Southern California ballroom dance hall, killing 11 people, had no known connection with the victims and investigators were still trying to determine a motive for the massacre, the Los Angeles County sheriff said Wednesday.
Before the shooting Saturday night, Huu Can Tran parked a motorcycle just a block away from the ballroom in Monterey Park, which investigators believe he had planned to use as a backup getaway vehicle, Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said during a news conference hours after police seized the motorcycle.
Tran opened fire on a mostly elderly crowd of dancers at the Star Ballroom Dance Studio, killing 11 people and wounding nine, police said.
The carnage, during what should have been joyful Lunar New Year celebrations, sent ripples of fear through Asian American communities already dealing with increased hatred and violence directed at them.
Some reports had said Tran frequented the dance hall and fancied himself as an instructor, but Luna said he hadn’t been there in at least five years and did not appear to target the victims specifically.
“We have not been able to establish a connection between the suspect and any of the victims thus far,” Luna said.
Luna said it wasn’t clear how long Tran had been planning the attack in the city about 8 miles (12.8 kilometers) from downtown Los Angeles or what prompted him to spray at least 42 bullets, taking time to reload his weapon, a variant of the MAC-10 semiautomatic machine pistol with a 30-round magazine.
Tran’s motive continued to elude detectives days after the tragedy as they searched piles of items and paperwork seized from Tran’s home and a van he used to flee, the sheriff said.
“It doesn’t make sense,” Luna said. “It really doesn’t.”
About 20 minutes after the carnage in Monterey Park, Tran entered another dance hall about 3.5 miles (5.6 kilometers) away in Alhambra, where an employee confronted and disarmed him during a brief struggle.
