ALLEN — A vigil was held Sunday evening at the Cottonwood Creek Church in Allen for the eight people who were killed in the mass shooting at Allen Premium Outlets on Saturday.
As previously reported by The Dallas Express, Mauricio Garcia, a 33-year-old Dallas resident, allegedly exited a silver sedan outside the outlet mall and proceeded to fire a rifle at innocent bystanders, killing eight and sending several others to the hospital, some in critical condition.
Garica was wearing a tactical vest, armed with a rifle and additional weaponry and ammunition stored in his vehicle. He was killed by an Allen police officer who was already on the scene attending to an unrelated matter.
Outside the church, before the event even began, anti-gun protestors lined a corner holding signs, several wearing orange shirts. One man held a sign that read, “Well-regulated militia MURDERS 8 people in Allen fuq your ‘thoughts and prayers.'”
Another man held one reading, “WE HAVE AN EPIDEMIC OF GUN VIOLENCE.”
Protestors near the vigil in Allen | Image by Joshua Carter/The Dallas Express
The gathering of hundreds was attended by Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, Attorney General Ken Paxton, and several other elected officials from Texas. They received applause from the crowd when their names were read off by a senior pastor.
“I don’t try to prescribe solutions to our mighty God cause his ways are so much higher than our own,” said minister Kelly Kitch from the podium, referencing scripture to try to console the congregation.
The congregation prayed in silence after a rendition of “Saving Grace,” and Allen Mayor Ken Fulk then addressed the crowd:
“Today’s vigil is about the victims and their families. We seek to honor them here today. We are saddened and shocked by yesterday’s tragic shooting. We offer our sincerest sympathy to the victims and their families. We are praying for you and we share in your grief,” Fulk said.
Fulk informed the gathering of local mental health services on offer and stressed the collective sorrow being felt by the Dallas suburb.
“As the healing begins, we will recover. We will not let the actions of one individual impact our resolve. We will band together as a community and will emerge even stronger,” said Fulk.
His sentiments were echoed by Allen Mayor Elect Baine Brooks, who said, “How did we get to [this] point? The victims and their families, the kids that were supposed to show up home … the people who had to witness it, we pray for them.”
Later in the vigil, an unidentified man wearing an orange shirt disrupted the event, shouting out, “What about the gun laws? What about voting out Republicans?”
The man was subsequently escorted out of the church.
A woman was also escorted out later in the service under circumstances that are not currently clear.
The Dallas Express spoke to a local church member named Laura Handcock at the vigil. Handcock said, “I think like everyone here, we’re just in shock and grieving for the families and the first responders.”
The identity of one of those killed in the shooting was confirmed by his family. Christian LaCour, 20, a security guard at the outlet mall, was gunned down, CBS Texas reported.
Burt Thakur, a candidate for Texas House District 3 (Allen) in attendance, said, “Whoever kills kids, man, they’re monsters. It affects all of us, and at the end of the day, it’s a bigger problem that we have to look at systematically. I don’t know what the answers are, [but it’s necessary] that we start addressing it.”
Speaking to The Dallas Express, Thakur said he was moved by one of the pastors who spoke at the vigil.
“He said that ‘in hindsight, people always have the best answers,’ but we seem to forget that we can’t even think when we’re lost. Look, people are going to talk about this, and at the end of the day, left, right, and center, everyone is going to have to answer to this. But first we must understand what happened,” Thakur said.
The shocking events of Saturday spurred debates over anti-gun legislation and whether existing regulations are working.
One of the anti-gun protestors spoke with The Dallas Express after the vigil came to a close.
“What I would like to see is the stop of the sale of assault-style rifles. That’s what I would like to see because those don’t have a place in society,” said Imanol Miranda.
“I don’t think any person needs to obliterate their fellow community members in less than a minute on a massive scale and leave only a pool of blood on the ground,” Miranda added.
That sentiment was not shared by others online, who stressed that the issue of mass shootings in the United States goes well beyond access to firearms.
Texas Rep. Steve Toth (R-Woodlands) tweeted, “The clear answer that stares us all in the face is to remove these violent kids from our classrooms as we did 40 years ago but no one has the courage … to stand up to the Left’s social justice warriors.”
“So, instead you’ll stand up one day soon and call for more red flag laws that take guns away from law abiding citizens,” Toth added. “You’ll then pat yourself on the back and declare the problem solved.”
Gov. Greg Abbott also pushed back on calls for ramping up anti-gun laws, noting on Fox News Sunday that the focus needs to be on addressing mental health issues.
“We’ve seen an increased number of shootings in states with easy gun laws as well as states with very strict gun laws. I think that the state in which the largest number of victims occurred this year is in California, where they have very tough gun laws,” Abbott said.