Nashville police are struggling to find anyone who knew Vincente David Montano, the 29-year-old man killed by officers after attacking theater-goers in Antioch on Wednesday.
Other than buying his movie ticket and asking for a cup of water, Montano didn’t talk to anyone during the attack, and police have shared nothing about a possible motive.
They describe Montano as a homeless transient with a history of mental health issues, including paranoid schizophrenia. They have not found any acquaintances of the man, nor anyone with homeless outreach agencies who remember him, police spokesman Don Aaron said Thursday.
“Our perception is that he was a transient,” Aaron said. “How he was getting from place to place, we don’t know. There may be citizens in this area who have seen him in the past month.”
Police said Montano attacked theater-goers during a showing of “Mad Max: Fury Road” at the Carmike Hickory 8 in Antioch just after 1 p.m.
They said he didn’t have a license or vehicle and they don’t know how he got to the cinema.
Police have found records of contact with Montano scattered across Nashville, Murfreesboro and other states.
He was charged with assault and resisting arrest 11 years ago in Murfreesboro and a history of three hospital commitments for mental health episodes there, and an additional out-of-state commitment, police said.
He listed his address as 1718 Rosa Parks Blvd., in Nashville. But that address is a women’s shelter where he could not have been living, police said.
Montano was reported missing on Monday in Texas, presumably by his mother, who told authorities she hadn’t seen him in three years.
Montano had visited the Nashville Union Rescue Mission in downtown Nashville on May 6 and again on Monday (the day he was reported missing) and Tuesday — although he never spent a night there, according to the shelter’s records. Police tried to check on him on Monday but could not find him at the shelter.
Before going to the theater, Montano bought a mango juice drink at a nearby Family Dollar.
Intimidating attack
Montano raised alarms inside the theater about 20 minutes before the showing.
He fiddled with a backpack and a duffel bag and was “staring down” two women.
Then, “suddenly and without any provocation,” he doused the women with chemical spray, Aaron said.
A man stood to intervene and was hit by Montano’s short, copper-colored ax. That scuffle allowed the other six people in the theater to run out to safety. The man was not seriously injured.
A lengthy standoff and shootout with police followed. Montano filled the auditorium with a chemical spray, threw items at officers and fired an Airsoft gun that resembled a semi-automatic pistol.
“He had multiple and continuous opportunities to end the situation. He chose not to,” Aaron said.
Police wouldn’t say how many shots were fired, but witnesses who recorded video outside captured dozens of blasts as Montano exited out a rear door, where five officers fired and fatally wounded him.
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