‘This lady’s going to die:’ 10 stories from Boise’s mall when a killer opened fire
One year ago, Boiseans were at the mall on a Monday afternoon to meet friends or family, or to buy lunch, clothes or jewelry.
Suddenly, they were forced to run. They hid under tables, behind sales counters and clothing racks. They scrambled behind doors, into back rooms and out into the parking lot of Boise Towne Square.
Gunshots sent them there. Gunshots that killed two people, injured several others and terrified and bewildered residents on Oct. 25, 2021, a few days before Halloween.
Eleven months later, police released a 465-page report on the mall shooting. On Oct. 3, a county prosecutor officially cleared the Boise police officers involved in the shooting of any wrongdoing, noting that an officer who fired his weapon and then tried to hit the shooter, Jacob Bergquist, with his patrol car “likely saved the lives of many citizens,” according to records obtained by the Idaho Statesman.
Multiple witness accounts were included in the report, with names redacted. Here are 10 of their stories.
1. The pizza worker on shift
Amber Wells, 21, was working at Mod Pizza near the mall when the shooting happened. Employees watched people running outside along with lots of police. Wells’s boss told employees to hide against the shop’s brick oven.
Wells told the Statesman she saw a woman outside in her car who was in distress, and who was trying to get out of her vehicle.
While her boss yelled at her to stay inside, Wells ran out of the pizza shop through a door, jumped a short fence and ran over to the woman, whom she found bleeding profusely from her eye and neck.
Wells put the woman’s car — which was still in drive — in park and pressed the woman’s sweater into her neck to stem the bleeding.
“I could hear my boss yelling at me, ‘Come back, you’re literally in the line of fire.’ I was just like ‘No, this lady’s going to die,’” Wells said.
Wells said she could hear gunshots around her. Mod Pizza is close to where Bergquist shot himself, behind a dumpster near Dave and Buster’s.
Shortly afterward, a police officer came over to her and told her to leave the woman, saying he couldn’t wait and protect her. Wells again said no, and he left.
“It was just me and this lady in the middle of the road,” she said.
Wells said she told the woman everything would be OK and tried to calm her down. The woman was trying to stand up. Wells encouraged her to stay seated. She found the woman’s glasses, which were at her feet and missing a lens.
After about six minutes, an ambulance came and took the woman to a hospital, Wells said. The woman survived, according to police.
During an exchange with police officers, one of Bergquist’s stray bullets hit a woman in the face as she was driving on Milwaukee Street, according to police. The woman has not been identified.
Afterward, Wells went back to work. Mod Pizza made free pizzas for the police at the scene.
Wells said she was in school while working at Mod and is now a certified nursing assistant.
At the mall in late October last year, Wells said she didn’t think too hard about what she was doing as she did it.
“I just saw her, and I thought, ‘that’s somebody’s grandma. Save her.’”
2. The mother of five with her mother and daughter
A mother of five was at Macy’s when she heard gunshots and saw a man shooting, according to a witness statement. The woman pulled her mother and daughter to the ground, after which they ran to the emergency exit and through the parking lot.
“We were very scared, crying because we did not know anything about my grandma,” the woman wrote in a witness statement in Spanish. “She was also with us at the mall but she was at a different store.”
The group stopped a car in the parking lot and asked for help from a couple. That couple gave them a ride to the family’s car, after which the woman saw her 81-year-old grandmother.
“It was a very, very horrible experience; it is not the same to see a shooting happen on television or for someone to tell you there was a shooting,” she wrote, noting she has trouble sleeping. “I cannot erase the shooter’s face from my mind. I feel the sound of the bullets in my ears.”
3. The woman leaving lunch with family
One officer responding to the shooting was assisting an injured officer when he “saw movement” in a nearby Honda minivan.
Opening the driver’s door, he found a woman who was “shaking uncontrollably and barely able to speak,” the officer’s account in the report said.
The woman “stated that she had just gotten into her van from having lunch with family when someone ran through the alley and began shooting. (She was) so scared that she crouched on the floorboard of her van and called her family to return. She estimated that she heard 12 rounds fired.”
The officer walked the woman across the parking lot to her family.
4. The man inside Macy’s
A man inside Macy’s at the mall heard a gunshot, turned to look and saw a man standing beside the escalators. He saw a security guard “go down,” as well as a black gun.
A mall security guard, Jo Acker, was the first victim of the shooting.
The witness then saw Bergquist “randomly shooting toward the air,” firing eight or nine rounds before the witness thought he heard Bergquist reload his weapon and then fire four to six more rounds.
“He said the suspect walked through Macy’s shooting randomly up into the air, shooting at the escalator,” the report said.
Another witness, interviewed by the same officer, tried to run up the escalator but then “laid down on the stairs.”
5. The friends shopping for gifts
One officer interviewed two men who appeared to be friends of Roberto Padilla Arguelles, the shooting’s second victim. Five people had come to the mall together to shop, one of the men told the officer.
According to previous Statesman reporting, Arguelles was at the mall to shop for gifts for his family. He worked as a truck driver in Rupert for three months at a time, after which he would return home to Mexico for three months, where his family lived.
While the group was taking the escalator to the second floor of Macy’s, the man said, he started hearing gunshots, and the group ran to the top of the escalator.
Arguelles “fell on the escalator behind him as the(y) ran to the top of the escalator,” the account said.
6. The couple shopping together
A couple interviewed by police reported being nearly killed during the shooting, having made eye contact with Bergquist.
The woman had come to Macy’s to shop for “a couple of sweaters,” the account said.
While walking around the side of a mall directory, the woman saw a man with a handgun take a “shooting stance” and saw another person going “down onto the ground after hearing several shots being fired,” the report said.
The shooter was “in front and to the left” of the woman and her husband, the account said.
The woman said her husband appeared to be in a state of shock, and that she pulled him toward the Lane Bryant store, where staff members helped them into a back room to hide.
“She knew that the suspect had watched her and her husband flee to the nearby Lane Bryant (store) to seek shelter and fully expected him to follow them into that store to continue his carnage,” the officer’s account of the interview said.
The woman was “adamant that she knew the suspect had fired his weapon at them and that he knew they had ran into this store,” the police account said.
Later that day, the woman called the officer who had interviewed her and said she had found a bullet hole in her husband’s clothing that went underneath his right armpit and through a “leather jacket, sweatshirt, and T-shirt.” Police later confirmed that a bullet hole had gone through the clothing, and noted that it appeared Bergquist was “intentionally shooting” at them.
7. The woman at Forever 21 with a friend
A woman interviewed by police was inside Forever 21 with a friend when the shooting occurred. She heard four loud gunshots, after which employees and customers barricaded themselves in a back room. Included in that room were “three young girls from Kansas that had been separated from their parents.” All of them were inside the room for over an hour.
While they were hiding, they heard people identifying themselves as Boise police, but the listeners “were unsure if it was actually the police and they remained silent,” the report said.
While barricaded, the woman saw rumors on social media that indicated there was more than one shooter.
It wasn’t until one employee’s father parked behind the store and told them that it was safe that they left the barricaded room, the report said.
8. The Macy’s employee in the jewelry section
A Macy’s employee interviewed by police said she was working in the jewelry section when she heard gunshots.
Someone said “run,” and she ran out of the store and hid behind a vehicle at the back of the Macy’s parking lot, according to the report.
She began to call police when a man with a holstered gun “put his hand on his gun holster and (tell) her not to call anyone,” the report said. “The male then began running towards the direction of Red Robin.”
Everything she saw happened quickly, and she “was frightened.”
Another Macy’s employee, who also hid among parked vehicles, heard someone saying “that is him” in the lot, and pointing towards a man wearing all black. The man told the other employee not to call anyone, and she responded that she “was not calling anyone,” the report said.
9. The woman shopping at Macy’s with her daughter and granddaughter
A woman, her daughter and granddaughter were shopping at Macy’s when they “heard shooting and saw people running,” the report said.
The women, who speaks Arabic, hid under a table inside Macy’s, after which “the male came towards them, seeing they were under the table, and started shooting at them on the ground,” the report said, noting that the bullets were hitting the floor next to them.
The woman said that one of the bullets “scratched” her daughter’s belly, and that she was also injured in her leg, which was bleeding. Metallic fragments were later found in her right leg.
Bergquist “kept going and was shooting as he was walking towards them,” the report said.
A security guard then helped them into a storage closet.
10. The shopper in a Macy’s checkout line
In a witness statement, a witness reported hearing gunshots while in the checkout line of Macy’s.
Looking for someplace to hide, the witness hid in “the middle of a rack of dresses,” and heard more gunshots and falling glass.
“I heard footsteps running, my sense was it was to my left,” the witness’ statement said. “I knew there were people hiding close to me, but no one moved. Everything was quiet. I texted (my husband) to let him know what was happening.”
“I was torn between being paralyzed by fear and a sense of wanting to help,” the statement said. “After what seemed like an eternity but was more like 10 minutes, I thought I heard a police walkie-talkie.”
The witness left the rack of clothes and walked to the escalators, which were shattered, and saw a man lying at the top. The witness “ran up” the escalators. Paramedics hadn’t arrived, but police officers were working on him.
“I couldn’t speak to ask if I could help with CPR,” the witness said. “I felt I would only be in the way.”
Another witness who hid in a storage room at Macy’s with others hid for about 45 minutes, after which the witness heard a bang on the door.
“We then prepared to defend ourselves if needed,” the statement said.
Later, police officers came in and escorted them out.
Statesman reporter Mia Maldonado contributed.
This story was originally published October 25, 2022 at 4:00 AM.
