maryland mall shooting
© Jim Watson/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMaryland State Police officers put on their gear as shoppers left The Mall at Columbia after a fatal shooting there on Saturday
Three people have been killed in a shooting at Columbia Mall in Howard County, Md. Saturday, police confirmed.

The suspect was among those found dead. His body was located near a gun and ammunition, police said. Three witnesses described the gun as a shotgun, though police have not yet confirmed the weapon used.

Police said they were "confident" that there was no other shooter involved in the shooting, which was first reported just after 11 a.m.

Two other people reportedly have been transported to hospitals with injuries that were not directly connected to the shooting, though they may have been related to the chaotic scene that followed.

The scene is now secure, though police are asking shoppers who took shelter in the mall to wait for police to evacuate them. There are believed to be "many, many people still in the mall," said Howard County Police Chief Bill McMahon at a press conference this afternoon.

No other information has been released about the other victims. McMahon would not speculate on the shooter's motive and said he did not know how many total shots were fired, though none came from police.

Eyewitnesses described a nightmarish scene inside the popular mall, crowded with weekend shoppers. One woman said she heard what sounded like "something being dropped" and then realized the sound was gunshots.

"They just kept shooting and it didn't stop," she said.

She rescued one child and then ran back to her job at a children's hair salon to secure the others.

"I work in Cartoon Cuts; I was downstairs getting a tea for my boss," she said. "And all of a sudden I heard ... it sounded like someone dropped something. And all of a sudden I see people fall, three people fall to the ground. And all I see is people going down to the floor and running.

"I just saw everybody run, so I ran."

Another eyewitness, a young woman, said: "We just heard gunshots, and then this lady came into the store and said there's a guy with a gun ... Me and my friend just ran in the back room.

"We were crying and we were just scared out of our minds, because our thought was that we were going to get shot."

News4 spoke to one man who said he was in phone contact with his daughter, who was taking shelter in a Bank of America inside the mall, along with dozens of others. She described a chaotic scene as shoppers at the mall were told to evacuate or shelter.

"People were panicking," the man said.

A statement from the mall said only that "Mall is closed. Believe that the situation may be over, but the mall is closed."

The mall is located in Columbia, Md., between Washington, D.C. and Baltimore.