Joe Biden is once again pleading for Congress to pass meaningful gun control after a man shot six people to death – including his ex-wife and stepfather – at three different locations in a small, rural Mississippi community on Friday.

“Enough,” the president’s statement said, noting that there had been at least 73 shootings in which at least four victims were wounded or killed in the first 48 days of this year.

Invoking a phrase that pro-gun advocates often use to deflect from discussing action after mass shootings, Biden’s statement added: “Thoughts and prayers aren’t enough. Gun violence is an epidemic and Congress must act now.

“We need – need – commonsense gun law reforms.”

Biden specifically mentioned requiring background checks on all gun sales, banning firearms with high capacities for ammunition, prohibiting domestic abusers from legally having weapons regardless of their relationships to those they have preyed on, requiring the safe storage of guns, and allowing firearms manufacturers to face civil liability for “knowingly [putting] weapons of war on our streets”.

“We owe action to American communities being torn apart by gun violence,” Biden said.

Biden’s remarks came after authorities alleged that 52-year-old Richard Crum unleashed a deadly rampage in Arkabutla, an unincorporated community with fewer than 300 people in Mississippi’s Tate county.

Armed with a shotgun and two handguns, Crum, authorities said, went to a convenience store about 11am on Friday and fatally shot a 59-year-old man named Chris Boyce, who was sitting in the driver’s seat of a pickup truck outside. Boyce’s brother was sitting next to him but ran away without being physically harmed.

As Tate county sheriff’s deputies arrived at the store, they received emergency calls from the home of Crum’s 60-year-old former wife, Debra. Crum had shot her to death shortly after returning from the office of a doctor treating her for a stroke she suffered recently, according to the local TV news station WMC, based about 45 miles north in Memphis, Tennessee.

Debra Crum’s husband, George Drane, described to WMC how he tried to – but couldn’t – fight off the attacker.

“I wrestled with him, and I lost, as you can see,” Drane said, with his head wrapped in a bandage and holding back tears. “We had a good day at the doctor’s office. We ate some soup when we got home and we were going to go into town.”

Deputies tracked Crum down to the home of his stepfather, 73-year-old George McCain. Crum allegedly shot dead McCain, his stepfather’s 78-year-old sister Lynda McCain, and two repair workers who happened to be there: John Rorie, 59, and Charles Manuel, 76.

One of the murdered repair workers was in the road, and the other was in a car, authorities said. Police said they found Crum inside a car, and he was arrested after surrendering to them, though not before businesses and a school had to temporarily lock down.

The local coroner’s office said Friday that five of the dead were from Coldwater, a community that neighbors Arkabutla. Boyce was from Lakeland, Florida.

Arkabutla sits on a reservoir that is a popular fishing and recreation spot. It is also known for being the home town of James Earl Jones, the Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony-winning actor.

The local sheriff, Brad Lance, said investigators had not immediately determined a motive. Lance could not recall any prior encounters between his agency and Crum, who is facing charges of capital murder and was being held without bond.

Later on Friday, Biden said he and first lady Jill Biden were grieving with the families of the victims, who were murdered four days after three were killed in an unrelated shooting on the campus of Michigan State University.

“We are … mourning … as we have for far too many Americans,” the president’s statement said.

Biden last year signed bipartisan legislation passed by Congress that expanded background checks for the youngest gun buyers while funding mental health and violence intervention programs.

But mass shootings persist despite what was hailed as the first major firearms safety bill to pass Congress in nearly three decades. The president has long argued that much more must be done to curb gun violence in the US.

Chances of more gun control measures passing on Capitol Hill seem slim, however. Biden’s fellow Democrats hold only a slender numerical advantage in the Senate, and their Republican opponents have a thin majority in the House of Representatives.