What do we know about the shooting of the church in Michigan and the arson attack

Investigators are looking for a motive after a gunman opened a fire in the church of Mormon in Michigan and set fire to the building, killing four people.

Officials said the attack on the church of Jesus Christ of the saints of the last days in Grand Blanc, a city of 60 miles (100 km) northwest of Detroit, happened during a Sunday service, which was attended by hundreds of people.

They named the suspect Thomas Jacob Sanford, 40 years old by Burton, Michigan, who was killed by police shortly after the shooting.

As a press conference on Monday, employees said the incident was a “targeted act of violence”, but said they had not yet established Sanford’s motive.

The officials did not specify the four people who were killed in the shooting, or the eight others who were injured, including one who was in critical condition.

Michigan Grathen Gretchen Whitmer urged residents not to speculate on the motive as employees conducted their investigation.

“Speculation is useless and can be downright dangerous, so just ask people to lower rhetoric temperature,” she said.

The shooting began around 10:30 EST (15:30 BST) on Sunday when a weapon crashed his car in the building and then started shooting in congregants.

A man told CBS News that he and others had left the church after hearing a “strong boom” of the vehicle crash before seeing the suspect to start firing a weapon in the building.

“It was just so unexpected,” said the conversation Paul Kirby. “After seeing the gun and started to hear him start shooting it, it was just a lot of fear.”

Shortly thereafter, the shooter lit the church using gasoline or other accelerator, employees said. They also found improvised explosive devices of a suspect, said James Deir, an agent of the Bureau for Alcohol, Tobacco, firearms and explosives.

Less than 10 minutes after the shooting, the shooter died in a shooting with police, officers said.

Investigators said on Monday that they had interviewed more than 100 casualties and witnesses as part of the investigation and spent all night processing the crime.

Although employees did not give a motive, White House press secretary Carolyn Levitt told Fox News that Sanford is “an individual who hates the people of the Mormon faith.”

The officials said the suspect was a former Marine, which was once located in Iraq.

Sanford told the local shop Clarxton News that he was a sergeant in Marines and was located in Faludja in Iraq in 2007.

“I’m glad to go,” he told the newspaper. “There are many changes we make in the Middle East, we make progress.”

Sanford had previous burglary arrests and was driving a drunken vehicle, employees said on Monday.

There is not much information available about the political beliefs of the suspect, but his Facebook profile presents a photo of him in 2019, bearing what he seems to be a shirt that encourages the re -election of Donald Trump in 2020.

Google Street View image of a Sanford property also seems to show a pro-Trump sign outside the house.

Sanford also turned out to be the father of a son who had serious health problems, according to his family publications and a fundraising page.

Sanford is a suburb of Flint of about 30,000 people, just a few miles from the city of Grand Blanc.