A suspected shooter accused of killing at least six people and wounding two dozen more at a Chicago Independence Day parade on Monday was arrested after an hours-long manhunt.
The arrest of 22-year-old Robert "Bobby" Crimo III came about eight hours after the mass shooting in the Chicago suburb of Highland Park as the US celebrated the Fourth of July holiday.
Late in the afternoon Monday, Highland Park police Chief Lou Jogmen had identified Crimo as the person of interest, saying he was believed to be driving a 2010 silver Honda Fit.
Crimo was spotted by North Chicago police near U.S. Highway 41 and Buckley Road. An officer tried to stop Crimo, but he briefly fled before being stopped, Jogmen said.
More than 100 law enforcement agencies had helped throughout the day to search for the suspect after he opened fire from a rooftop along the parade route. The police dragnet had started with a perimeter around the core of Highland Park, gradually spreading to include police activity in nearby neighborhoods and finally other suburbs.
Crimo was described as a longtime resident of the suburb who posted online videos under the moniker "The Awake Rapper."
An archive of 17 YouTube videos apparently belonging to Crimo alternates between wholesome and foreboding.
In one video, a teen who looks like Crimo happily skateboards and roughhouses with his pals. Another captures what appears to be a police-escorted government motorcade leaving an airport before a man who appears to be Crimo swivels the camera to his tattooed face.
A black-and-white video, taken with a selfie stick, shows a glum figure that looks like Crimo walking through a neighborhood. In another, a newspaper with a Lee Harvey Oswald headline can be seen over his shoulder.
The most chilling video is the final one in the series, uploaded eight months ago, which features footage of a young man in a bedroom and a classroom along with cartoons of a gunman and people being shot.
Superimposed on the video is a rotating image of interlocked triangles. "I need to just do it," a voice-over says over instrumental music.
"It is my destiny. Everything has led up to this. Nothing can stop me, not even myself. Is there such a thing as free will, or has this been planned out like a cosmic recipe? It is what I've been waiting for in the back of my head, ready to be awakened. It's what I was sent here to do, like a sleepwalker walking steady with my head held high, like a sleepwalker walking blindly into the night."
Meanwhile, an investigation into the firearm used in the attack was underway after authorities announced that a rifle had been recovered at the scene.
Details about the recovered rifle were subject of an urgent, expedited trace by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Firearms trace information, in general, provides manufacturing details as well as where a firearm was shipped to for sale by a federally licensed firearms dealer.
The trace includes contacting the dealer, who must check paperwork to determine who the firearm originally was sold to. Once complete, the information will be turned over to Highland Park police, authorities said.
The Lake County Major Crime Task Force, Highland Park police and the FBI were leading the investigation, but "there are dozens of police agencies on the scene and our federal partners are deployed as well," according to police.
The chaos began about 10:15 a.m. when the gunman, allegedly Crimo, stood on a roof and opened fire, shooting at least 30 people — at least six of them fatally, about 15 minutes into the northern suburb's Fourth of July parade, according to police and the Lake County sheriff's office.
