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2 dead after ‘disgruntled employee’ opens fire at Walmart in Mississippi: Police

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A Walmart in Southaven becomes the scene of a workplace massacre before sunrise.

Two Walmart employees were dead within minutes of a gunman opening fire in the parking lot and inside the store in Southaven, Mississippi, roughly 13 miles south of Memphis, early Tuesday morning. Police say the shooter was a fellow employee with a grievance against management, and that officers who arrived within three minutes of the first 911 call had to shoot him twice before he went down. One of those officers took a bullet to his body armor and walked away with only minor injuries.

• Store manager Anthony Brown, 40, of Olive Branch, and employee Brandon Gales, 38, of Hernando, were killed — one shot in the parking lot, the other inside the building where roughly 60 employees were working.
• Southaven Police Chief Macon Moore confirmed a responding officer was struck by gunfire but survived because the round hit his vest; a second officer then shot the suspect twice, ending the threat.
• DeSoto County District Attorney John Champion charged 39-year-old Martez Tarrell Abram with two counts of murder, noting Abram had no prior criminal record and had purchased his firearms legally.

Timeline of the Shooting Incident

The gunfire began around 6:30 a.m. on July 30, 2019, according to Southaven police, with the first victim shot outside in the parking lot before the gunman moved into the store itself. Investigators say roughly 60 employees were inside at the time. Southaven Mayor Darren Musselwhite and investigators later described the shooter as a disgruntled employee acting on a personal grievance against his employer rather than targeting customers at random.

Police reached the scene inside three minutes of the initial call — a response time Chief Moore pointed to directly when discussing why the toll wasn’t higher. When officers confronted the suspect, he turned his weapon on them, striking one officer who was saved by his body armor. A second officer returned fire, hitting the suspect twice and bringing the standoff to an end.

He was saved by his vest.

The Victims and the Suspect

Anthony Brown, 40, of Olive Branch, was the store’s manager. Brandon Gales, 38, of Hernando, was a longtime employee. Both were killed in the attack — one in the parking lot, the other inside the building.

Authorities identified the shooter as Martez Tarrell Abram, 39, a Southaven resident and Walmart employee. He was taken to Regional One Health in Memphis, Tennessee, where he underwent surgery after being shot by the second responding officer. DA John Champion said Abram had no prior criminal record and that the firearms recovered at the scene had been purchased legally — details that shaped the early read on the case as a workplace grievance rather than a broader plot.

The Charges and What Comes Next

Champion charged Abram with two counts of murder, with the possibility of additional or upgraded charges once the case goes before a grand jury. Walmart corporate officials confirmed Abram had been suspended just days before the shooting after showing a knife to a coworker, an incident that had already prompted a police report before the gunfire started.

Beyond the shooting itself, first responders dealt with a reported small fire inside the store and a bomb squad was called in to examine a suspicious package on the property. The Southaven Police Department and the ATF handled the scene investigation and searches of Abram’s apartment, while the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation took over the review of the officer-involved shooting, as is standard procedure in Mississippi whenever police use deadly force.

The store remained closed while investigators worked the scene, and the case now heads toward a grand jury presentation that will determine whether Abram faces charges beyond the two murder counts already filed. For a store manager who by all accounts was simply doing his job and an employee who’d been suspended for a knife incident days earlier, the next hearing will decide exactly how much more Abram answers for.