BATON ROUGE, La. — An incident in a Baton Rouge Walmart Tuesday that was first thought to be a shooting and led to widespread panic and the evacuation of the store all began when a man threatened a gun-carrying customer with a pair of scissors, police officials now say.
According to WBRZ, an fight near the customer service section in the Walmart on Tuesday afternoon was the cause of what customers initially feared was a "possible active shooter" situation, according to 911 calls.
The first man, who is still at-large, apparently approached the other and said "Hey, I've got something for ya," before walking away and then returning with a pair of scissors and threatening to stab the second man, East Baton Rouge Sheriff's officials said.
The second man, who was carrying a gun, took out his weapon and pointed it at the suspect in self-defense. The suspect then turned to run away from the gun owner and dropped the scissors in the process.
He then reached to pick the scissors back up and that's when officials said a witness apparently shouted "gun!"
That shout prompted what a sheriff's official called "total chaos."
During that chaos, customers told responding officers that they had heard what they believed to be shots fired in the store. Furthermore, one person arrived at a hospital after the incident and told emergency room staff he had been shot in the incident.
However, police later learned that person's injuries happened from falling while attempting to flee the store. No one was actually shot throughout the incident.
EBRSO officials said the man who pulled out the gun has a legal, up-to-date concealed carry permit and they are confident he won't be charged in the incident as he acted lawfully.
The scissor-wielded suspect is still at-large.
Officials said that, perhaps due to increased sensitivity from the weekend shooting at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, customers raced from the store and in some cases placed 911 calls to report a shooter at the store.
“Given the recent events in El Paso and Dayton, and given the initial information we received via 911 calls and witnesses exiting the store, we responded with what we feel is appropriate,” he said in a statement. “The national climate regarding these incidents has the nation on edge and citizen’s anxiety levels much higher than normal.”
Dozens of law enforcement officers responded to the scene as if there were an active shooter.