U.S. & World

OMAHA, Neb. (CBS News) ― A man opened fire with a rifle at a busy department store Wednesday, killing eight people in an attack that sent holiday shoppers screaming through a mall as others barricaded themselves in dressing rooms.

The young shooter, who left a note predicting, "Now I'll be famous," wounded five others, two critically, then took his own life.

Police have not said anything about the motive, if it is in fact known to them. But a family friend says he recently broke up with a girlfriend and got fired, and a source tells CBS News affiliate KMTV that he tried, but failed, to get into the Army.

Witnesses said the gunman sprayed fired down on shoppers from a third-floor balcony of the Von Maur store. Police recovered an SKS assault rifle believed to have been used by the gunman.

Police received a 911 call from someone inside the mall, and shots could be heard in the background, Negron said. By the time officers arrived six minutes later, the shooting was over, she said.

"We sent every available officer in the city of Omaha," Negron said.

The Omaha World-Herald reported that the gunman had a military-style haircut and a black backpack, and wore a camouflage vest.

"My knees rocked. I didn't know what to do, so I just ran with everybody else," said Kevin Kleine, 29, who was shopping with her 4-year-old daughter at the Westroads Mall, in a prosperous neighborhood on the city's west side. She said she hid in a dressing room with four other shoppers and an employee.

Authorities say the shooter - identified by police as 20-year-old Robert A. Hawkins of Bellevue, Nebraska - was found dead on the third floor with an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound, and his victims were discovered on the second and third floors.

Sgt. Teresa Negron said the gunman killed eight people, then apparently killed himself. Authorities gave no motive for the attack and said they did not know whether he said anything during the rampage.

Hawkins was kicked out by his family about a year ago and moved in with a friend's family in a house in a middle-class Bellevue neighborhood, according to Debora Maruca-Kovac, a nurse, who along with her husband took in Hawkins, a friend of her sons.

"When he first came in the house, he was introverted, a troubled young man who was like a lost pound puppy that nobody wanted," Maruca-Kovac said.

Maruca-Kovac says Hawkins recently suffered two other setbacks, breaking up with a girlfriend, and earlier this week, getting fired from his job at a nearby McDonald's.

At 1 p.m. Wednesday, he called Maruca-Kovac, telling her that he'd left a note for her in his bedroom. She says she tried to get him to explain, but he hung up.

Maruca-Kovac then called Hawkins' mother, went to the Maruca-Kovacs' house, retrieved the note - in which Hawkins wrote that he was "sorry for everything," would not be a burden on his family anymore and "now I'll be famous" - took it to authorities and went to work.

Hours later, Maruca-Kovac said, she saw victims being brought in to the Nebraska Medical Center, where she works.

Among the eight people shot to death by the gunman, five are reported to be female, and three male.

KMTV reports the dead include both shoppers and store employees.

"Everybody was scared, and we didn't know what was going on," said Belene Esaw-Kagbara, 31, a Von Maur employee. "We didn't know what to do. I was praying that God protect us."

Mickey Vickory, who worked at Von Maur's third-floor service department, said she heard shots at about 1:50 p.m.

She and her co-workers and customers went into a back closet behind the wrapping room to hide, then emerged about a half-hour later when police shouted to come out with their hands up. As police took them to another part of the mall for safety, they saw the victims.

"We saw the bodies and we saw the blood," she said.

Keith Fidler, another Von Maur employee, said he heard a burst of five to six shots followed by 15 to 20 more rounds. Fidler said he huddled in the corner of the men's clothing department with about a dozen other employees until police yelled to get out of the store.

Witness Shawn Vidlak said the shots sounded like a nail gun. At first he thought it was noise from construction work at the mall.

"People started screaming about gunshots," Vidlak said. "I grabbed my wife and kids we got out of there as fast as we could."

Shortly after the shooting, which came three weeks before Christmas, a group of shoppers came out of the building with their hands raised. Some were still holding shopping bags.

Police told people to park their cars at businesses across from the mall and to wait for their loved ones, then directed them to an Omaha hotel to await information.

Nebraska Medical Center spokeswoman Andrea McMaster said it had three victims from the mall shooting, including a 61-year-old man in critical condition with a bullet wound to his chest.

Three victims were brought Creighton University Medical Center; two died and the other was critically wounded, spokeswoman Lisa Stites said.

Wednesday evening, police used a bomb robot to search a Jeep Cherokee left in the mall parking lot. Authorities believe the vehicle belonged to Hawkins. Officers had seen some wires under some clothing, but no bomb was found.

President Bush was in Omaha on Wednesday for a fundraiser, but left about an hour before the shooting.

"Having just visited with so many members of the community in Omaha today, the president is confident that they will pull together to comfort one another," White House press secretary Dana Perino said.

This was the second mass shooting at a mall this year. In February, nine people were shot, five of them fatally, at Trolley Square mall in Salt Lake City. The gunman, 18-year-old Sulejman Talovic, was shot and killed by police.

A Von Maur store executive tells KMTV that it has a policy in place for such emergencies and employees, within the past year, had gone through training on how to handle emergencies.

The store, along with the entire Westroads Mall in Omaha, will be closed Thursday.

The Von Maur store is part of a 22-store Midwestern chain. The sprawling, three-level mall has more than 135 stores and restaurants. It gets 14.5 million visitors every year, according to its Web site.

(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)