The City of Allen is planning events Monday to mark the anniversary of the shooting at Allen Premium Outlets. May 6, 2023, police say a gunman started shooting at the mall, killing eight people before an officer at the mall on an unrelated call shot and killed the suspect.
After the shooting, police went from store-to-store telling people they were safe to leave, but they had to leave their cars behind. Many walked across the street to a gas station and restaurants to wait for rides.
"We all just started running to the back of the store, and the store manager just shut the blinds and locked the door," one man said.
"I grabbed my girls, we all ran to the back until the police came and got us," another said.
In addition to the eight who were killed, seven others were injured. Medical City McKinney and Medical City Plano received patients.
"I was so scared when the incident happened, but later on, I was realizing how lucky I was to survive," Suneetha Pinnamaneni, who was injured in the shooting, said in a video provided by Medical City Healthcare.
May is National "Stop the Bleed Month," and Medical City is urging people to learn techniques to control severe bleeding after trauma, saying a first responder at Allen Premium Outlets last year helped Pinnamaneni survive.
The group, Moms Demand Action, held a memorial at Green Park in Allen Sunday to mark the anniversary. They placed 408 red flags in the ground, saying each one represents a person killed by gun violence in Texas this year.
The City of Allen is encouraging a city-wide moment of silence Monday at 3:36 p.m. to mark the time shooting started last year. The city will also host a memorial at 6:30 p.m. at Credit Union of Texas Event Center.
The remembrance event is free and open to the public. The Allen Philharmonic Orchestra commissioned a piece of original music that will be played. The composer, SMU lecturer Lane Harder, says the piece includes eight solos, one for each person who was killed.
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