Las Vegas – A driver intentionally steered his car onto a sidewalk on the crowded Las Vegas Strip, then accelerated in a deadly scene resembling “humans being mowed down like a lawnmower,” police said Thursday.
Two people were killed and dozens were injured in Wednesday’s incident. Eight of the injured remained hospitalized Thursday,
Stephen M. Ressa, 27, of Rialto, Calif., faces charges of murder and attempted murder.
“It appears he did this intentionally. The reason is questionable,” a police spokesman said Thursday.
Ressa also had been sought by his hometown police in a near-fatal assault Monday on his mother, who owned the car Ressa was driving in Las Vegas.
The victims, including 11 tourists, were walking in front of the Bally’s and Paris hotel-casinos when the car struck them, then crashed into a wall and came to a stop in a landscaped area in front of Bally’s.
Ressa, who was unhurt, was arrested at the scene by an off-duty Las Vegas police officer.
Police said Ressa was wanted for questioning in the assault on his 54-year-old mother.
“He punched her numerous times in the face and choked her into unconsciousness and stood over her with a butcher knife,” said Rialto police Detective Sgt. Reinhard Burkholder, adding that Ressa may have been under the influence of methamphetamine.
