Maryland mall shooting: Police hopeful Darion Aguilar journal gives answers in murder of Brianna Benlolo and Tyler Johnson
Authorities are still trying to piece together a motive for a Maryland teenager to gun down two people before killing himself in a Maryland mall over the weekend. Police report they are analyzing a journal belonging to the shooter where he “expressed general unhappiness” with his life.
The journal was found when the Prince George’s County Police Department received a missing persons report for 19-year-old Darion Marcus Aguilar Saturday afternoon, a couple of hours after the Mall of Columbia shooting. Two people were left dead: Brianna Benlolo and Tyler Johnson.
Authorities say Aguilar took a taxi to the mall on Saturday morning and entered the building near Zumiez. He went downstairs to a food court directly below the store, then returned less than an hour later, dumped the backpack in a dressing room and started shooting.
Aguilar was armed with a shotgun, “plenty” of ammunition and some “crude homemade explosives” police say.
He purchased the 12-gauge shotgun legally last month at a store in neighboring Montgomery County, and fired it six to nine times inside the mall.
Benlolo, a 21-year-old single mom lived near Aguilar but police have not reported a connection between the two. Police Johnson, the other victim, has no connection to Aguilar or Benlolo, which has been confirmed by relatives.