A 25-year-old Connecticut man on Saturday allegedly pulled out a gun on two women because they did not thank him for holding a door open for them, according to local police.
Law enforcement responded to a Hamden Family Dollar store at about 3:15 p.m. after receiving a report that a man was pointing a gun at two customers outside of the store, the Hamden Police Department wrote in a statement.
When officers arrived, a witness told police that a man, later identified as Joshua Murray, allegedly pointed a gun at the women for whom he held a door open. They told officers he allegedly grew irate after they did not say thank you, according to the statement.
When police located Murray, they allegedly found a firearm on him, and when they arrested him, he allegedly interfered. However, nobody suffered any injuries, the statement said.
More details about the incident, including the identities of the victims, have not been released by police. Hamden is a town of more than 60,000 people located just north of New Haven.
Murray is charged with carrying a pistol without a permit, two counts of second-degree breach of peace, and interfering with a police officer. He is expected to appear in court on August 2 and is being held on a $25,000 bond, police said.
Even though nobody was injured in this case, gun violence remains a major issue across the United States, with fatal shootings occurring regularly. In 2021, more than 20,000 people died from gun violence in the U.S.—a significant increase from previous years, according to the Gun Violence Archive, an organization that tracks the country's gun violence. So far this year, more than 10,000 people have already been fatally shot.
There have been several violent incidents to occur in recent weeks.
A father, identified as 29-year-old Servando Hamros, in Evanston, Illinois, was fatally shot in a park while playing the mobile game Pokémon Go with his young daughter at about 9 p.m. Thursday evening. His 7-year-old daughter was in the area, but was not injured.
"I guess he had a confrontation with some other people that were here, and they killed him. My granddaughter FaceTimed us, saying, 'Help me, daddy's shot.' In the park by herself, with her dad," his mother said in an interview with news station WBBM-TV.
That same day in Philadelphia, police arrested a man who allegedly fatally shot three people who he had followed on public transportation in recent days. The suspect has been identified as 21-year-old Derrick Jones and is charged with three counts of murder.
pittipat on July 19th, 2022 at 02:40 UTC »
I had some guy try and call me rude for not thanking him for opening the door for me. I had said thank you but it was in the middle of shutdown and he apparently didn't hear me through my mask. The irony of him being rude to me for thinking I was rude to him.
timeshifter_ on July 19th, 2022 at 02:39 UTC »
Pulling a gun on someone for anything less than a legitimate fear for one's safety should be grounds to have your permit revoked and the firearm taken. You do not point a weapon at anything you don't intend to kill. That's like... one of the first four rules of handling a firearm.
Colonelfudgenustard on July 18th, 2022 at 23:02 UTC »
They like to tell us an armed society is a polite society, so maybe he's just keeping things polite.