US military records show Sanford was a US Marine from 2004 to 2008 and an Iraq war veteran.
Coincidentally, another 40-year-old Marine veteran who served in Iraq is a suspect in a North Carolina shooting that killed three people and wounded five others less than 14 hours before the Michigan incident.
Police in Southport, North Carolina, accused Nigel Max Edge of firing on a waterfront bar from a boat on Saturday night. Edge has been charged with three counts of first-degree murder and five counts of attempted murder, police said.
According to court records, a federal lawsuit that Edge had filed against the US government and others describes him as a decorated Marine who suffered severe wounds, including traumatic brain injury in Iraq.
The lawsuit, which was dismissed, showed Edge was previously known as Sean William DeBevoise before changing his name.
“SURREAL” ESCAPE
In Michigan, a woman who gave her name as Paula described her escape as “surreal” in an interview with WXYZ television.
“We heard a big bang and the doors blew. And then everybody rushed out,” she said, adding that there was no security and the shooter opened fire on parishioners as they fled.
“I lost friends in there and some of my little primary children that I teach on Sundays were hurt. It’s very devastating for me,” she said.
The Mormons, formally known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, follow the teachings of Jesus but also the prophecies of Joseph Smith, a 19th-century American.
Grand Blanc, a town of 7,700 people, is about 100km northwest of Detroit.
“My heart is breaking for the Grand Blanc community,” Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer said in a statement posted to social media.
“Violence anywhere, especially in a place of worship, is unacceptable.”
President Donald Trump in a statement on Truth Social said that the shooting “appears to be yet another targeted attack on Christians in the United States of America”.
“THIS EPIDEMIC OF VIOLENCE IN OUR COUNTRY MUST END, IMMEDIATELY!”
