Bizarre … Columbia, MD Mall Gunman Darion Marcus Aguilar was Reported Missing Prior to His Murder/Suicide Saturday and Shooting Deaths of Brianna Benlolo & Tyler Johnson

Talk about bizarre, man reported missing after case turned into a murder/suicide.

19 year old Darion Marcus Aguilar, a College Park, MD resident was reported missing at about 1:40 pm on Saturday, January 25, 2014. However, earlier in the day the Howard County Police had a much bigger incident occurring as a gunman walked into the Columbia Mall in Columbia, Maryland and started shooting. In the end, two were dead, Brianna Benlolo, 21, of College Park, MD, and Tyler Johnson, 25, of Ellicott City, MD.  Also, the gunman turned the shotgun on himself and committed suicide.

Darion Marcus Aguilar

Police said Sunday they received a missing persons report for Darion Marcus Aguilar at about 1:40 p.m. Saturday. Howard County Police say Aguilar went into the Mall in Columbia about 11:15 a.m. Saturday, armed with a shotgun and homemade explosives. He fatally shot two store employees before killing himself.

A Prince George’s officer went to Aguilar’s home in College Park to speak with his mother about 5 p.m. Saturday and saw Aguilar’s journal. The portion the officer read made him concerned for Aguilar’s safety.

However, as police were trying to determine the identity of the mall shooter, they were also investigating the report that Darion Marcus Aguilar. The police pinged the phone of the missing 19 year old and would learn that it was coming from the Columbia Mall. Tragically, the police would then discover in a bizarre twist of events that the missing man and the individual who had killed two people at the mall at about 11:15 a.m. before shooting and killing himself were the same person, Darion Aguilar.

As PGPD tracked the missing person’s phone, they discovered it was pinging from Columbia Mall. The missing person and the yet-unidentified deceased shooter turned out to be the same person, Darion Aguilar, 19.

Aguilar’s mother had called about 1:40 p.m. from their home in the 4700 block of Hollywood Road in College Park to report him missing. An investigator talked with the mother and read Aguilar’s journal, which had wording that raised concern for his safety, police say.

UPDATE I: Cops – Mall gunman expressed ‘general unhappiness’ in journal.

Police state at this point they have no motive and that there was no known connection between the shooter and his victims. Sometimes you don’t need a motive, sometimes these things happen because you have a depressed individual who has crossed the line of no return. You cannot rationalize the irrational.

He added that police served a search and seizure warrant at the shooter’s house and retrieved documents, computers and other potential evidence, including a journal.

In that journal, Aguilar “does express some general unhappiness with his life, but I really don’t have any other information about that now,” the chief said.