Police kill man for trying to attack US theatre

Washington, Aug 6 Police shot dead a man who tried to attack moviegoers in Antioch, Tennessee, with a hatchet and a rifle, law enforcement authorities in the state capital of Nashville said on Wednesday.

At least one person was injured in the incident, which occurred around midday when police received a telephone report of shots fired at the theatre in Antioch, on the outskirts of Nashville.

According to police spokesman Dan Aaron, two police officers initially responded to the call and shortly thereafter a SWAT team stormed one of the movie theatres where the film "Mad Max: Fury Road" was showing and confronted the suspect, exchanging gunfire with him and eventually killing him.

Aaron told the media that police believed that the threat had ended with the gunman's death.

The spokesman said that the white, 51-year-old man -- who reportedly sprayed some kind of chemical inside the theatre and was wearing a surgical mask -- lived in the Nashville area, adding that at least one person was slightly injured by the hatchet he was carrying.

He also reported that FBI agents had been deployed to the scene to help local authorities.

Two weeks ago, a man opened fire in a movie theatre in Lafayette, Louisiana, killing two women and wounding nine other people before being killed by local police.