The gunman involved in the year’s deadliest shooting last week likely died eight to 12 hours before his body was discovered by police, the Maine medical examiner said Friday.
Army reservist Robert Card was accused of killing at least 18 people and injuring 13 more in a mass shooting at a bowling alley and restaurant in in Lewiston, Maine on Oct. 25. He escaped the scene of the shooting alive, resulting in a massive search which ended when his body was discovered two days later.
A medical examiner’s report found that Card “likely” died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound about 12 hours before he was found, The Associated Press reported.
His body was discovered near a recycling center where he previously worked. Hundreds of law enforcement agents from all over the country came to central Maine to search for the gunman.
President Joe Biden and the first lady visited Lewiston to pay respects to the victims of the shooting on Friday.
“Jill and I have done too many of these,” Biden said outside the bowling alley where the shooting began. “Jill and I are here, though on behalf of the American people to make sure you know that you’re not alone.”
The shooting has renewed debates over gun control and an assault weapons ban. Card’s unstable mental health was flagged to law enforcement multiple times before the shooting, though his firearms were never taken from him, despite state law.
Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine), a Lewiston native, said the shooting changed his mind on support for an assault weapons ban.
“Out of fear of this dangerous world that we live in, in my determination to protect my own daughter and wife in our own community, because of a false confidence that our community was above this and that we could be in full control, among many other misjudgments, I have opposed efforts to ban deadly weapons of war, like the assault rifle used to carry out this crime,” Golden said at a press conference last week.
“The time has now come for me to take responsibility for this failure, which is why I now call on the United States Congress to ban assault rifles, like the one used by the sick perpetrator of this mass killing in my hometown of Lewiston, Maine,” he continued. “For the good of my community, I will work with any colleague to get this done in the time that I have left in Congress.”