The massacre that never happened!
On Sunday last, a single VCA drove into a church parking-lot in Wayne, MI (a Detroit suburb), exited his vehicle, and (with some kind of long gun) immediately fired several mostly unaimed shots into the church building. Those shots struck the building but caused property-damage only.
Witnessing what was happening, an alert church-parishioner, who was also in the parking lot and in his vehicle, drove toward the suspect, striking him and knocking him down.
The suspect then fired his weapon at the vehicle that had just hit him, likely striking it, but inflicting no injury to the driver.
Shortly thereafter, at least two armed church security guards (who were also members of the Church), hearing, then seeing, what was happening, fired at the still-armed suspect, inflicting fatal wound(s).
Security guards were presumably armed only with (concealed) pistols, but neither weapon types, nor calibers, were reported.
In any event, suspect was DRT
One security guard was struck in the leg by at least one bullet (presumably fired by the suspect) and was transported to a nearby hospital with non-life-threatening injury(s).
Prior to exiting his vehicle, this VCA had been “driving erratically/recklessly,” which garnered the attention of the church’s security staff.
The VCA’s mother was a member of the church, and the VCA himself had previously attended church services there several times. Not surprisingly, he had a history of “mental-health issues.”
No word on whether the weapon used by the VCA was legally owned, legally obtained, nor to whom it legitimately belonged.
In the aftermath of the incident, the local Chief of Police has been very supportive of the church’s security staff, speculating that their aggressive and heroic actions likely prevented a mass homicide.
In a subsequent televised interview with a local news reporter, one of the church security guards who fired fatal shot(s) at the VCA revealed that he had never been sure of what he would do in such an emergency.
Obviously, his training kicked-in, and without hesitation, he took care of business!
Lessons: We continuously train as diligently as we can for such life-threatening emergencies, incorporating physical skills with philosophical resolve, but as this security guard articulated:
1) We can never be absolutely sure of what we will do “when the moment arrives.”
2) With any luck, we’ll never know!
“Sometimes, in order to save a life, you must end a life!”
Police Axiom
PS: I highly recommend not talking with the media in the aftermath of any lethal-force incident in which you may have been involved.
Confine all such conversations to your lawyer (at least in the short term)!
/John
