A 30-year-old man recounted the terrifying ordeal of being taken hostage by the suspect involved in the Setia City Mall shooting. The suspect, armed with a gun, forced him to drive away from the mall while his family was held at gunpoint.
Reflecting on the harrowing 45-minute experience, the man described how the suspect suddenly appeared in the parking area and immediately brandished a firearm at his family.
“I was in complete shock. To prove the gun was real, he even fired a shot at the wall,” the man told Harian Metro.
Before the incident unfolded, he had been dining at a restaurant inside the shopping mall with his wife and four children. Suddenly, chaos erupted in the mall.
“I quickly gathered my family and rushed toward the parking lot. As we made our way to the car, I heard a loud explosion,” he said.
Initially, he mistook the noise for a car hitting a speed bump, a sound he had heard many times before. However, as more vehicles began fleeing the area at high speed, he realized something was seriously wrong.
Just as they were about to get into their car, the suspect appeared out of nowhere and pointed a gun at them, ordering them inside the vehicle. The man complied, with the suspect taking a seat in the back.
“I pleaded with him to put the gun away so my children wouldn’t be terrified. He then instructed me to drive out of the mall’s parking lot and take the highway exit,” he recounted.
The ordeal lasted approximately 45 minutes. Before leaving the vehicle at a spot near the highway, the suspect removed the memory card from the dashcam, presumably to erase any evidence of his presence.
Authorities have since identified the suspect as a local man in his 30s, with a criminal record that includes 11 prior offences related to drugs and other crimes.
Selangor police chief Datuk Hussein Omar Khan confirmed that the suspect was recognized through CCTV footage and intelligence gathering. “We are actively pursuing him,” he stated.
At the time of the incident, security guards at the mall had urged people to leave the premises immediately, though many, including the victim and his family, were unaware of the severity of the situation. —NST
Image—The Star
