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Holiday shopping took a terrifying turn Tuesday morning when a man with a gun took a woman hostage inside a store in the Greenspoint Mall.

The mall was quickly evacuated.

“The police just told everyone to start running, so we started running toward all the stores, we let down the gates and everything and the next thing you know the police are telling us to exit the mall,” Calvin O’Bryan said.

A short time later, police found the man and woman dead. They believe he killed her before turning the gun on himself.

“As the officers approached the store, they heard one gunshot.  They immediately secured the scene,” Lt. Gallier with the HPD said. “SWAT officers found two victims inside the store, one male and one female.”

"Apparently, from what we've been able to determine so far, the victim was the only target of the suspect," Lt. Gallier said.

Officials did not release the names of the victims, but family members at the scene said the female victim is Joanna Gonzales.

They described Joanna as a beautiful young woman who loved her friends and family deeply.

According to the Greenspoint Management District, the situation started when the victim's boyfriend called, threatening to harm her.

Gonzales, who worked at Body Luxuries, a lingerie store, called mall security, but her boyfriend arrived before security could get there.

The man apparently confronted her at about 9:45 a.m. as she was opening the security gate over the store, said Houston Police Lt. Albert Mihalco.

Gonzales was the only employee present. After struggling, the man moved her into a back room of the store and shot her in the head, Mihalco said. She was found wearing only a bra and panties, but police said they did not know if she’d been sexually assaulted.

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Mall customers and employees were evacuated after the shots were fired.

"There was a struggle in the back room," Mihalco said. "I'm not sure if he tried to rape her or what was going on."

HPD SWAT officers happened to be nearby and responded quickly to the scene.

Mall employee Deborah White said she was about to raise the security gate that covered the Ashley Stewart store where she worked when a security guard ran down the mall corridors, pounding on gates and doors and telling everyone to evacuate.

“I just left my coat and got out,” White said.

Another employee preparing for Christmas shoppers was Tom McKnight, 70, who has greeted children at the mall as Santa Claus for the last seven years. He said was wearing his costume and had just left the breakroom when he heard police gathering, then a gunshot about 100 feet away from him.

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Joanna Gonzales

“That’s about the worst thing that’s happened since I’ve been here,” McKnight said. “But I’m just here during the Christmas season. This is a bad time of the year for this to happen.”

Glenda Amos, who conducts consumer surveys inside the mall, said someone else in a Santa outfit warned her that a man with a gun was holding a hostage somewhere in the mall.

“Santa Claus told me to go back in (the office),” she said.  “Police started like running to me. When I peeked out the door, that’s when I saw they had shields, hats and I saw some of them had guns. I said, ‘They’ve got guns. Somebody’s out here trying to rob somebody.”’

A van from the Harris County medical examiner’s office pulled up to one of the mall’s entrances about 1:30 p.m. Workers hauled out the bodies on gurneys and the van left the scene about 2:30 p.m.

“The Greenspoint community is deeply saddened by this. It’s a tragedy for the mall, it’s a tragedy for the community, it’s a tragedy for the families.  This is a community that has worked tremendously hard towards public safety and has made huge, huge gains in creating a safe environment,” said Jocklyn Keville, Vice President Marketing and Public Affairs with the Greenspoint District.

After the shooting, crowds of evacuated mall employees stood outside in the parking lot behind police tape, waiting for information.

“Somebody got stabbed Saturday in the mall. They got cut Saturday in the mall, so I guess it’s just the holidays.  All we can do is pray and hope for the best,” O’Bryan said.

The Associated Press contributed to the report.