A knife-wielding woman was fatally shot by police outside a Walmart in the US state of Nebraska after she kidnapped a child, police said.
The assailant abducted a three-year-old boy out of the Omaha supermarket at knifepoint on Tuesday in an apparently random attack, police said. Footage from officers’ body-worn cameras showed her wielding the weapon at the child.
Police said she refused to drop the blade, and that she cut the boy’s cheek before two officers fired at her.
The suspect, Noemi Guzman, 31, who had a history of mental illness, was pronounced dead at the scene. The boy was treated for non-life threatening injuries at hospital.
Investigators said the store’s surveillance video showed the suspect shoplifting the knife.
She then approached the child and his babysitter, brandished the weapon and forced the adult to walk ahead while the child stayed seated in the shopping trolley, police said.
The suspect directed them through the store and into the car park, before officers arrived, said police.
The boy’s mother, Sara Hillman, told the BBC’s US partner CBS she has been asking herself: “What if it could have gone a different way?”
The boy’s father, Casey Hillman, urged parents to hold their children tight “because you never know how it can turn out”.
“Pay attention to what’s going on around you,” he said.
Their son, who normally loves being outdoors, was scared to go outside the next day, they said.
Police records show a woman with the same name as the suspect was arrested in 2024 for attempting to light a fire inside a home and injuring her father with a knife.
She then allegedly broke into a Catholic church, again armed with a knife, and destroyed property while a priest barricaded himself in a room.
She was reportedly found not responsible by reason of insanity.
A judge ruled she was suffering from schizophrenia and should remain under the court’s supervision, according to local media.
By BBC News
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