Valley View Mall was evacuated today after police began a hunt for a gunman inside Roanoke's largest shopping complex.

Dozens of city police and state troopers were searching the mall for a man with a rifle, said state police Sgt. Rob Carpentieri.

Police raced to the shopping complex after receiving three reports of a man with a gun entering Macy's, said city police spokeswoman Aisha Johnson. Two reports came from shoppers and the third from a mall employee, Johnson said.

Officers set up a mobile command center in the parking lot and methodically searched for a man, "attempting to determine whether or not he had a firearm," Johnson said.

Police barricaded Valley View Boulevard, the road that loops around the shopping complex, and detoured traffic.

Hope Trachtenberg-Fifer said she was shopping inside Macy's about 5:45 p.m., when store employees asked shoppers to leave.

Store employees "were clearly panicked," Trachtenberg-Fifer said.

She asked an officer if she could resume shopping soon.

"We don't know where he is with the rifle right now," Trachtenberg-Fifer said the officer told her.

[link to www.roanoke.com]