Arkansas man sentenced to life without parole for 2024 mass shooting at grocery store

Damage can be seen to a front window from a shooting at the Mad Butcher grocery store in Fordyce, Ark., on June 21, 2024. (Colin Murphey / Arkansas Democrat-Gazette via AP)

FORDYCE, Ark. — An Arkansas man who killed four people and injured 11 others in a mass shooting at a grocery store last year was sentenced Monday to life in prison without parole.

A state judge sentenced Travis Eugene Posey to four life sentences for each count of capital murder. Posey was also sentenced to 220 years in prison for 11 counts of attempted capital murder.

Posey pleaded guilty last month to the shooting, which occurred last summer at the Mad Butcher grocery store in Fordyce, a city of about 3,200 people located 65 miles (104 kilometres) south of Little Rock.

Judge Spencer Singleton handed down the sentence after testimony from victims’ family members during a hearing in Fordyce.

“You don’t deserve to be part of our story,” Hanna Sturgis said during the hearing, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported. Sturgis’ father, Roy Sturgis, was killed during the shooting.

Posey, who did not speak during Monday’s hearing, has been held without bond since the shooting and previously pleaded not guilty to the same charges.

Prosecutors and police have not publicly identified any motive for Posey, who was shot and injured by officers who exchanged fire with him. Police have said he did not appear to have a personal connection to any of the victims.

During the midday shooting, Posey carried a 12-gauge shotgun, a pistol and a bandolier with dozens of extra shotgun rounds, authorities said. He fired most, if not all, of the rounds using the shotgun, opening fire at people in the parking lot before entering the store and firing “indiscriminately” at customers and employees, police said. Multiple victims were found inside the store and in the parking lot, police said.

Posey lived in New Edinburg, a small town of about 150 people located southeast of Fordyce.

One of the women injured in the shooting has sued Posey, seeking monetary damages to cover medical care, lost earnings and other expenses as a result of the shooting. Attorneys for the woman have requested that a judge enter a default judgment against Posey, as he has not responded to the complaint. A judge has not ruled on that request.

The shooting temporarily closed the only grocery store in Fordyce, prompting food distribution sites to be set up around the community. The Mad Butcher reopened 11 days after the shooting.