(Trends Wide) — Police in Farmington, New Mexico, released chilling video of the shooting in the town on Monday and provided details about how residents rushed to help the victims.

Police Chief Steve Hebbe described a chaotic scene in the neighborhood. Three people were killed and six others were injured in the mass shooting. Hebbe said residents helped officers track down the shooter. Recordings released by police on Thursday come from surveillance cameras at the gates and two cameras carried by police officers who responded to the shooting.

A high school student used a recently purchased AR-15 rifle to unleash a torrent of bullets from his backyard before continuing his rampage through a New Mexico neighborhood, leaving another community to wonder if such a tragedy could have been prevented. .

Police say Beau Adam Wilson acquired his assault weapon in November, a month after his 18th birthday. He started the killing spree by firing his rifle indiscriminately from his yard, Farmington police said.

Wilson then dropped his AR-15-style rifle and continued his onslaught, walking through the neighborhood and shooting at houses and cars at random, police said.

Three elderly women lost their lives. The attacker was killed by the police. And another seemingly safe place in the United States, a residential neighborhood, is now facing the horror of a mass shooting.

But Farmington is by no means alone. In the first five months of this year alone, American communities have experienced at least 227 mass shootings, with at least four fatalities in each incident.

What do the videos show?

One of the videos from a doorbell surveillance camera shows the vehicle of the first victim, Shirley Voita, rolling down the street slowly with the driver’s door open. Hebbe explained to reporters at a press conference on Thursday that the video was recorded after Voita was shot and fell from the vehicle. The woman later died at a hospital.

Later, the minivan occupied by the second and third victims, Gwendolyn Schofield and Melody Ivie, is seen coming to a stop in a second clip from the same camera. Police believe the women were about to help Voita when the attacker opened fire on them. Schofield, 98, and her 73-year-old daughter, Ivie, died in their vehicle.

Loud gunshots are heard on the video and bursts of debris are seen coming out of the driver’s window. Gunfire continues as three vehicles pull up shortly after the deaths of Schofield and Ivie. One of them ends up turning the corner and two others back out to quickly get away from the gunfire.

The victims do not appear in the videos released this Thursday. Farmington police also did not immediately release video in which the police chief said Wednesday of the shooter being seen walking through the neighborhood.

At one point, an off-camera voice apparently says, “Come kill me!” Hebbe said: “I think ultimately in his (the attacker’s) head he has made the decision that he is going to stand and fight until he is killed.”

How the massacre unfolded

The shooter, wearing a bulletproof vest, fired at least 141 shots from his yard with the rifle Monday morning before abandoning it in some bushes and leaving the property with two handguns, according to authorities.

The shooter walked through the neighborhood and “randomly shot whatever came into his head to shoot” before being fatally shot by police, the Farmington police chief said in a videotaped statement.

“There were no schools, no churches, no individuals to be targeted,” he said.

Authorities received more than 200 911 calls as gunshots tore through the neighborhood, nestled in a center of commercial interest near the “Four Corners of the Southwest” geographic area (the extreme southwest of Colorado, extreme southeastern Utah, extreme northeastern Arizona and northwestern New Mexico).

Armed with 22-caliber and 9-mm pistols, the assailant continued to fire as he walked to a church, where he was shot dead by police, according to Hebbe.

Body camera videos released Thursday show Farmington Police Sergeant Rachel Discenza running with officers toward the shooter. As she emerges from the cover of some bushes, gunshots erupt and the sergeant is heard saying, “I’ve been shot.”

Another officer is seen quickly approaching Discenza after she fell to the ground a second time, asking her where she was shot and about her tourniquet. She calls for a doctor as she offers to help him.

Next, another officer approaches the sergeant asking her where she was injured, and the video ends. Discenza is recovering at her home after being injured in the pelvic region, according to Hebbe.

In another video, an officer with a rifle is seen searching for the shooter and directing other officers to his location. The officer is heard yelling for residents to take cover and calling for more units.

The agent yells “show me your hands” and shots are fired. The officer is then heard yelling “subject is down” and the officers run to the downed attacker and handcuff him.

The mass shooting killed three women who were riding in a car in the morning.

Gwendolyn Schofield, 98, and her daughter Melody Ivie, 73, died in their car.

Shirley Voita, 79, was also shot in a car and later died at a hospital, authorities said.

Among the six people injured is Farmington Police Sergeant Discenza, who was shot during a shootout with the shooter. Andreas Stamatiadas, a New Mexico State Police officer, was shot as he was on his way to the scene.

Both officers have already been released from the hospital, along with the other four injured victims, Farmington Deputy Chief Baric Crum said.

More than 150 bullet casings scattered throughout the neighborhood in a “wide and complex scene” spanning more than 400 meters, according to authorities.

In total, the attacker fired at three vehicles and six houses, although none of the victims was in a residence.

“The amount of violence and brutality these innocent people faced is beyond belief to me,” Deputy Chief Kyle Dowdy said.

“I don’t care how old they are. I don’t care what happens to you in life. Killing three innocent old ladies who were absolutely in no condition to defend themselves will always be a tragedy.”

10 more weapons and 1,400 rounds of ammunition

In addition to the AR-15 rifle Wilson bought a month after his 18th birthday, authorities believe a family member legally owned two of the guns used in the killing. Investigators are trying to determine how the attacker got them.

The attacker also bought three magazines for the rifle just two days before the massacre, the police chief said.

In addition to the three weapons used in the attack, 10 more pistols and 1,400 rounds of ammunition were found in the attacker’s home, the chief said.

After the shooter was killed, authorities found a short handwritten note in his pocket and were trying to “reconstruct” the meaning of the note, Hebbe said.

Wilson had only had “minor violations” with law enforcement before the violent attack, Dowdy said.

Some family members interviewed by law enforcement raised concerns about Wilson’s mental health, the deputy chief said, but it’s unclear if any issues had been diagnosed.

“We’ll end up finding out in the next few days what medication he was on, if he was on any, if he was under a doctor’s care in any way, shape or form,” Hebbe said.

The attack left Farmington “shocked to the core by an unthinkable event that deprived families of their loved ones,” Mayor Nate Duckett said.

It came just a day before graduation at Farmington High School, where the shooter was a student.

— Trends Wide’s Cheri Mossburg, Steve Almasy and Elizabeth Wolfe contributed to this report.