LOS ANGELES (CNS) — A 9-year-old boy and 25-year-old woman are hospitalized in critical condition Wednesday after being stabbed at a Target store in downtown Los Angeles.

Los Angeles Police Department officers arrived at the store at the FIGat7th shopping center shortly after 6:20 p.m. Tuesday to find two stabbing victims and a third victim who had been punched by the suspect while trying to intervene in the stabbings, Capt. Elaine Morales said.

The woman was stabbed in the chest and the boy was stabbed in a shoulder, Morales said. Both underwent surgery for their injuries.

A homeless man suspected of the stabbings then approached a security guard, who shot the suspect at least once in the abdomen, police said. He was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead, LAPD Officer Luis Garcia told City News Service.

A local news station reported LAPD Chief Michel Moore said the suspect “told the young boy that he was going to stab him and kill him. He repeated that more than once.”

Moore said the boy tried to get away from the suspect before he was attacked. “Without any further provocation [he] suddenly attacked and stabbed this young child in the back,” the chief said.

Moore said Good Samaritans intervened in both cases, pulling the victims to safety. The suspect — identified only as a homeless man — grabbed a knife off a shelf to commit the stabbings, Morales said.

Moore said the attack was unprovoked, and officers are trying to determine a motive for the stabbings. “This is by no means a frequent occurrence here,” Moore told the local news station.