Omaha mall reopens with extra security

OMAHA, Neb. - With extra security on hand and holiday shoppers waiting at the doors, the Westroads Mall reopened Saturday morning, three days after a gunman killed eight people and himself at the mall's Von Maur store.

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The store, however, remained closed. Yellow holiday lights brightened Von Maur's exterior, but black tarps draped the inside of the doors. Wreaths sat on tripods just outside, and a note from management said the store will reopen soon. No date was given.

A makeshift memorial of flowers, notes and poems covered about two-thirds of the bottom steps of the entrance gunman Robert Hawkins used to enter the store. On display were eight foam snowflakes, each with a picture of a victim.

Outside the mall, two Red Cross vans and a Salvation Army unit were set up near the food court entrance.

Early shoppers faced wind chill temperatures of only two degrees above zero before trickling into the food court or the mall proper, as retailers started raising their security gates at 8 a.m.

Marge Andrews said there was a very different feeling in the mall Saturday compared to her regular walks there with a friend. She and her husband John, 51, had come to buy sporting goods for their son and clothes for their daughter.

"I come out here almost every morning, and (today) it was kind of just an eerie feeling of, I don't know, quiet," said Marge Andrews, 49.

"It doesn't feel like a Christmas feeling," her husband said.

Mall security videotape released Friday shows Hawkins entering the Von Maur department store Wednesday, leaving, then returning about six minutes later, clutching his midsection as if hiding something and stalking toward the elevators.

Police did not release video from the third floor where Hawkins fired the gun. But a still image taken from the videotape shows Hawkins with his sleeves rolled up, aiming his AK-47.

Mayor Mike Fahey greeted shoppers and reassured retailers that the city stood behind them as they struggled to regain momentum during their make-or-break holiday shopping season.

"I came in here and I was wondering how I would feel about it, but I feel fine," Fahey said. "I did not necessarily look at Von Maur ... but I feel fine."

The mall is safe, the mayor said. "We have a lot officers on duty, and they will be on duty all day long," he said.

Omaha police spokesman Bill Dropinski said he couldn't discuss specifics, but that extra officers were in the area.

The Von Maur company, which operates stores across the Midwest, said it had established a memorial fund with the local United Way for the shooting victims and their families and invited public contributions. It also said it was helping families of the eight victims with funeral arrangements and grief counseling.

Police said Hawkins, 19, of nearby Bellevue, fired more than 30 rounds inside the crowded mall, striking 11 people. Six died where they fell, one died on the way to a hospital and another died despite 45 minutes of emergency treatment at another hospital.

Three other people were wounded, two seriously.

Hawkins was a troubled teenager who spent four years in a series of treatment centers, group homes and foster care after threatening to kill his stepmother in 2002. He had recently broken up with a girlfriend and lost his job at a McDonald's.

"I've just snapped. I can't take this meaningless existence anymore I've been a constant disappointment and that trend would have only continued," he wrote in a suicide note left at the suburban house where he lived.

Some who knew Hawkins in suburban Bellevue said Friday that they tried to warn police about his recent behavior.

Kevin Harrington, who lived nearby, said he contacted police a month ago to report his and other parents' concerns that Hawkins and his friends had easy access to guns and sold drugs.

Harrington, 45, said he told police in Bellevue about a month ago that one of Hawkins' friends offered to sell Valium to his 13-year-old son. Harrington said he also told police that Hawkins had once shot at a car during a drug deal gone bad.

"We told them about the drugs, we told them about the guns, and nothing was done," he said.

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Associated Press Writer Nelson Lampe in Omaha contributed to this report