Four shot dead at US mall

The string of violence began when police went to a home to check on an elderly woman whose relatives had not seen her for days.

The woman was found dead and her car missing, Missouri police spokesman Tony Sanders said.

The car was spotted later in the day at a petrol station by an officer, who pulled the driver over and was shot in the arm, police said.

The officer, whose wound was not life-threatening, returned fire and shattered the window of the gunman's car.

The car took off and was seen later at the Ward Parkway shopping centre in south Kansas City.

The man pulled into a parking space and fired at the cars on either side of him, killing two people, authorities said.

He fired more shots, wounding two people, then went inside the mall, Sanders said.

Police shot the gunman dead outside a Target store at the mall, the spokesman said.

Target employee Cassie Bradshaw, 19, was in a break room with two other people when they heard shots.