PARAMUS, N.J. — The 20-year-old man intent on dying who fired multiple shots inside New Jersey’s largest shopping mall was found dead early today of a self-inflicted wound, authorities said. There were no other injuries.

The shooting incident trapped customers and employees for hours as police scoured stores for the gunman.

Investigators don’t believe the gunman, identified as 20-year-old Richard Shoop, intended to shoot anyone when he began firing at the ceiling and elsewhere at the Garden State Plaza on Monday night shortly before the mall’s closing time, Bergen County Prosecutor John Molinelli said.

“We think he went in with the intent that he was not going to come out alive,” Molinelli said.

He said Shoop was known to authorities and had had a problem with drugs, but he did not elaborate.

The prosecutor said Shoop left a note with his family. While Molinelli would not call it a suicide note, he said it did “express that an end is coming. It could have been prison. ... It could have been what he did last night. It gave his family reason to reach out to us.”

Shoop’s body was discovered about 3:20 a.m. today in an area that is not accessible to the public, Paramus police Chief Kenneth Ehrenberg said. Shoop did not work at the mall, he said, and police are still trying to determine why he went there.

Chaos erupted shortly before the mall’s 9:30 p.m. closing time when authorities said a man dressed in black and wearing a motorcycle helmet fired shots. Molinelli said the weapon, which was modified to look like an AK-47, belonged to Shoop’s brother, who owned it legally.