[Breaking news update, posted at 9:21 p.m. ET]
Vincente David Montano, the man who was killed Wednesday by Nashville police after he allegedly went after moviegoers with a hatchet and pepper spray, had been committed to a mental institution four times — twice in 2004 and twice in 2007 — police spokesman Don Aaron told reporters.
[Previous story, posted at 9:04 p.m. ET]
A man wielding a hatchet and shooting pepper spray was killed at a Tennessee movie theater on Wednesday after police responding to reports of a disturbance shot him as he tried to go out the back door, Nashville police said.
Vincente David Montano also had an airsoft pistol, police said in a tweet that showed a gun recovered at the scene. Such a weapon can fire plastic or BB pellets.
Nashville police spokesman Don Aaron said Montano had been reported missing to Texas police two days ago and they had notified authorities in Tennessee.
Aaron told reporters that one moviegoer suffered a minor cut on a shoulder from a hatchet before officers killed the suspect.
Police chief Steve Anderson said the suspect likely was 29 years old. Earlier, police had described him as a 51-year-old local man. He did have identification on him, Anderson said, but authorities want to check fingerprints to confirm his identity.
The wounded man had a superficial injury to his arm, fire department spokesman Brian Haas said.
The man, who was identified as Steven, told reporters that police did a “phenomenal job” in responding to the calls for help. He was one of eight people in the theater, and one of three who was pepper sprayed by the assailant. He said his daughter was also sprayed.
“I am very, very grateful that no one else got injured here today — other than the person who perpetrated this,” Steven said.
No one was transported to a hospital, Haas said, but Steven, his daughter and another woman suffered irritation from pepper spray apparently used by the suspect, who was wearing a surgical mask. The pepper spray contained red dye, Anderson said.
The suspect also had two backpacks with him, Aaron said. The bomb squad destroyed one backpack that contained a “hoax device,” Aaron said.
Police were called to the Carmike Hickory 8 movie theater complex in the Nashville suburb of Antioch at 1:15 p.m. CT. Two officers were already at the mall working a car accident when people came running toward them. The officers were inside the complex withing two minutes, Aaron said.
One officer — who entered the theater and fired at the man before backing away — said he saw a gun. The SWAT team arrived and had to don gas masks due to the heavy chemical spray in the theater, Aaron said. The man tried to flee out the back door.
Brad Ransom, who told CNN he works across the street from the theater, said he saw four or five officers along the side of the building around the time of the fatal shooting.
More than a dozen gunshots, fired in rapid succession, can be heard in a video recorded during the fatal shooting. The video doesn’t show the shooting.
A woman who worked at a Sprint store near the scene told CNN’s Brooke Baldwin that about three hours earlier, a man with two backpacks tried to enter her store through their back door.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives sent a team to help with the investigation.
Antioch is a community in southeast Nashville.
