The Austin Police Department on March 5 released 911 calls, police body camera footage, and surveillance video footage from the deadly mass shooting in the city’s crowded Sixth Street entertainment district early on the morning of March 1.
Federal authorities are still investigating potential terrorism links to the shooting, which came a day after the United States started a war with Iran.
In the 911 calls, frantic bystanders can be heard screaming while victims plead for help.
“There are people dead over here. There’s multiple people shot—we need help right now,” one caller said.
Surveillance video footage shows the suspect, Ndiaga Diagne, 53, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Senegal, walking with what police stated was an AR-15 rifle.
Police said Diagne climbed inside a black Cadillac SUV and opened fire while driving southbound alongside the popular bar Buford’s. He eventually parked near the intersection of West Sixth and Wood streets and exited the SUV before firing at another pedestrian, according to police.
Local authorities also released graphic police body cam footage showing officers’ near-immediate response arriving at the scene and neutralizing Diagne.
“Down! Everybody down, down, down, down! Where is he?” an officer said before locating and shooting the suspect.
Body cam video footage shows an officer approaching the gunman from a different direction before shooting him and repeatedly warning him to “stop moving.”
Diagne was later pronounced dead at the scene.
Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis called the footage “difficult to see” in a press conference on March 5.
“We didn’t do this for the shock value. This is about being as transparent as we can,” Davis told reporters. “Any video showing the suspect firing his pistol into the crowd is too graphic to show, and we will not share that publicly.”
The shooting occurred shortly before 2:00 a.m. on March 1 outside Buford’s Backyard Beer Garden, a bar in the city’s Sixth Street entertainment district that is close to the University of Texas at Austin campus.
Police stated that Diagne fired shots from his SUV at people on the sidewalk and inside the bar, killing three and wounding more than a dozen others.
The suspect fatally shot Savitha Shan, 21, and Ryder Harrington, 19.
Police announced on the evening of March 2 that Jorge Pederson, 30, had also died from his injuries.
The majority of victims were shot outside the bar, according to Davis.
“This devastation just doesn’t affect the community,” she said. “And my goodness, I don’t think any of us can imagine what these families are going through right now, the suffering that they are dealing with. But our hearts are with them.”
Davis also announced on March 5 that Diagne’s only previous contact with law enforcement was a 2022 welfare check in New York City that “referenced his mental health.”
“I don’t know that they had enough to do a commitment for him. I think what I’m hearing is they gave him resources to call, that type of thing,” she said.
Davis said Austin police are still working with their partners at the FBI to investigate the possible links to terrorism.
Local and federal authorities are reviewing digital evidence after conducting two search warrants and are not yet “ready to talk about exactly what that nexus is” regarding a potential tie to terrorism, Davis told reporters on March 5.
