ROYAL PALM BEACH, Fla. – Timothy Wall posted the warning on his Facebook page: He wanted to kill people, including children.
Then he walked into a Publix grocery store in Royal Palm Beach and pulled a gun on a 1-year-old boy in a shopping cart, shooting him to death with one bullet.
He didn’t count on the child’s grandmother fighting back. Police said the 69-year-old woman went after the gunman, but he knocked her down and shot her dead, too. Then, they said, Wall killed himself.
The social media warning should have been enough for concerned friends to call police, Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw said Friday, clearly angry. Wall’s gun could have been seized, he said. Innocent lives could have been saved.
Bradshaw said his office had no indication the public was in danger from the 55-year-old Wall: “You think a damn soul told us about that? No. And if it sounds like I’m angry, it’s because I am.”
The shooting occurred just before the lunch hour Thursday at The Crossroads plaza at 1180 Royal Palm Beach Blvd. Investigators say they have no indication that Wall knew the woman and her grandson, Bradshaw said.
After detectives reviewed store surveillance video, Maj. Talal Masri laid out the tragedy minute by minute on Friday:
—The grandmother entered the store at 11:07 a.m. and placed the toddler in one of those grocery carts meant to resemble a car for children. Wall, dressed from head to toe in black, came to the store on a red scooter.
That was the second time he had gone to the Publix on Thursday. A uniformed sheriff’s deputy was shopping the first time he entered, and Wall apparently left.
He walked in again at 11:29 a.m. using a golf putter as a cane. Minutes later, at 11:31 a.m., Wall spied the woman and grandson in the produce section.
At 11:34 a.m., Wall pulled out his gun and shot the toddler.
The toddler’s grandmother tried to wrest the gun from Wall, jamming it. As Wall reloaded, he pushed the woman to the ground, shooting her and then turning the gun on himself.
The shooting was over by the time the first sheriff’s deputy arrived and found the three bodies, Teri Barbera, spokeswoman for the Sheriff’s Office, said Thursday. No one else was hurt.
The Sheriff’s Office is not releasing the names of the victims, citing their interpretation of Marsy’s Law, which grants certain privacy rights to victims and families.
The Palm Beach County Medical Examiner’s Office received the bodies of seven people whose deaths on Thursday needed to be investigated. Among them were the names Litha Varone and Samuel Varone.
According to database records, Litha Varone lived in Royal Palm Beach and was 69. At a nearby home, believed to be where Samuel Varone lived, a law enforcement officer stood outside Friday, telling the South Florida Sun Sentinel that the family was not ready to make a statement.