At least one dead and nine injured in Michigan church shooting

This is CNN breaking news. Good afternoon. Thank you so much for joining me. I'm Danny Freeman sitting in for Frederica Whitfield and we're beginning this hour with breaking news. A mass shooting at a Mormon church in Michigan has left one person dead and nine others injured, including Children. Police say the shooter rammed his truck through the front doors at the same time. A large fire started at the church. Now, officials just gave a press conference a short time ago. Let's take a listen.

Here to give you some preliminary details on an incident that happened earlier today at 1025 AM within Grambling Township. First off I'd like to say our thoughts and prayers go out to the victims of this incident, which is completely unnecessary and unavoidable. The incident that we're going to talk about here today, as I said, was happening at 1025 AM at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which is located at 4285 McCandless Road. During this incident, what we know right now is that a 40 year old suspect from Burton, he's a male, he drove his vehicle

through the front doors of the church. He then exited his vehicle firing several rounds at individuals within the church. 10 gunshot victims have been transported to local hospitals at this time, including one who has been deceased. Officers who were trained immediately responded to the area. One was a DNR officer,

and then one was a Grand Blanc Township officer where they met the suspect and they engaged in gunfire with that particular individual, neutralizing that suspect and that suspect is no longer with us. As I said, it is a 40 year old male from Burton. During all this incident as well, there was a fire that ocu We do believe that we wil victims once we have that

the Grambling Township Fire Department within the past hour. So where we go from here is we have investigators, we're going to do search warrants on the suspect's residence, we're going to find out if there was a motive, we're going to go through cell phone records, things like that. We had FBI, you know, they're devoting 100 agents to this area because as you can imagine, there's a lot of witnesses that were within the church and that is a lot of witness information statements that we have to obtain. So I'd like to thank all the agencies who responded. The city of Grand Blanc, Genesee County,

Oakland County Sheriff's Office, Flint Township Police Department, the DNR, the State Police, and the ATF. I will provide additional information for you at 5 p.m., but I am willing to take any questions that you have that I could possibly answer right now. Chief,

the kind of the progress the suspect set the fire of his vehicle and then r or did it all happen at t from what I understand. A a preliminary uh investig

what I have been briefed the vehicle through the f investigation right now f briefed on is that he ram the front door, exited, t shots. Um, we are still t exactly when and where th from and how it got start

was deliberately set thou in an active service when this happened? Yes, the service was active. There was hundreds of people within the church.

Are you sure it's only one suspect at this point or is it possible if it's a health

center, fire, whatever? Yes, it is one suspect that we know of at this point. We do not believe that there's a threat to the public. We believe that we have the guy who did this.

Sir, could you comment at all on the severity of the injuries?

We have a couple in critical condition. Like I said, one is deceased. The rest of them are in stable condition. So a couple, maybe three or two, I'm sorry. One deceased, the suspect is deceased as well well and then multiple victims are in critical condition. We do believe that we will find some

additional victims once we find area where the fire was.

Word on the weapon, yeah,

and assault rifle.

India is far as ammunition to be.

Lot of ammunition that I don'

known to authorities and

we don't have any of that a large fire and we do believe that there was people up there that were near that fire and they were unable to get out of the church. So we do believe that we will find additional victims once we're able to search that once there's no signs of a fire reigniting. So do you believe that the victims that are still there, they succumb to fire injuries or gunshots or you're not not sure, but I could prov

hopefully at five p.m. Ch shots were fired. Yes. No idea how many at this tim

the church? Is there like and then gathering space

community that I have not been in so I can't tell you the layout. Chief, can you kind of describe the process of how things change for tactical response when there's an active fire? Every training I've seen, it's always been a building that has not been on fire. So how do you deal with an active shooter when you have tha as well? Well, we are her township and there's a lo the state of michigan. We

trained to go right to th shooter situation and I'm and the DNR who responded immediately took that sus was no addi answer some of the questions that you guys went over here today.

So okay, Supervisor Bennett.

Well, Scott Bennett, Grand Lake Township Supervisor Scott SCOTT Bennett, BENNETT. First let me say we are heartbroken. be on an ETT. First, let m we're gonna do everything the families, our community getting thr and uh, it's something th ever wants to have. And u

best to do everything we the outpouring of support from both national and st and we probably will take them up on their offer. So we appreciate that very much, and we appreciate the community reaching out to us also.

So the details are yet to come, as Chief Renny has said, and we'll wait for a little bit later today when we have the rest of the situation assessed, but it may take a little while to do that. But thank you for all the support. And I'm sure that the families and the victims are going to need that. It's a tragedy that nobody wants to, to encounter. Thank you. Chief, before you step out, can

you go over the process for family members where you want them to go,

who they should call to get more

information or your patient?

Yeah, so those family members they are in a secure area right now. They have. Ben taken over to Trillium, so that's where the FBI will interview them and then release them from there. I mean, in terms of anybody who might be at home who was not there, who wants to check in to see if their loved one is okay, is there a number or place that you want them to go?

Yes, you could call the Grand Blanc Township Police Department, 810-424-2611.

Thank you. All right. We've been listening to a news conference from local officials in Grand Blanc, Michigan, about an hour north of Detroit, where a mass shooting has occurred at a Mormon church. One killed. The suspect also killed. At least nine others injured. And officials there are saying we do believe we will find additional victims.

And officials there are saying we do believe we will find additional victims. We'll have much more on this breaking story right after a quick break.