GRAND BLANC, MICHIGAN / SOUTHPORT, NORTH CAROLINA — Authorities are investigating two back-to-back mass shootings carried out over the weekend by Marine veterans, attacks that left seven people dead and more than a dozen injured.
The first shooting took place at a Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Grand Blanc, Michigan, while the second erupted at a waterfront bar in Southport, North Carolina. Despite the separate locations, the cases are drawing national attention because of the suspects’ shared background as Marine veterans of the Iraq War.
Michigan Church Attack Leaves Four Dead
Investigators say 40-year-old Thomas Jacob Sanford of Burton, Michigan drove his pickup truck through the chapel doors during Sunday worship services, firing an assault rifle at congregants before setting fire to the building.
Four people were killed, and eight others were injured — two critically — before Sanford was killed in a gunfight with police. Authorities later discovered four improvised explosive devices made from consumer-grade fireworks inside his truck, along with American flags mounted on the vehicle…