When I awoke this morning, I had absolutely no idea of last nights events. We have no TV, and the radio gets very little reception. What news we do see is always on the computer but if something wasn't considered big enough to make the front pages at the news sites, we don't see it. So when I saw the news vans on my way to Church, I briefly wondered why there were there and shrugged it off knowing that someone was bound to know about it and would tell me at fellowship. What I was not expecting was the severity of the news.
I had gotten a cup of plum spice tea and was deliberating a pastry after arriving at Church when a friend greeted me. She mentioned how uplifting the service was, which was needed after what had happened. I guess she must have noticed the blank look on my face because she said "You don't know?" and immediately started describing it. I just stood there in shock as James tried to hide under my sweater and Kitty chewed on the string to her hat. When she excused herself to extricate her youngest child from a small pile of kidlets, I called Carey to see if he had heard about it yet as well but he was just as dumbfounded as I was that this had happened in our relatively peaceful town.
Last night between 11:30 p.m. and 1:30 a.m., a sniper fired into the dispatch center inside the ourthouse to deliberately lure people into the line of fire. One officer, Lee Newbill, was shot when he rushed to the scene. He later died at the hospital; the first police officer to die in the line of duty in Moscow. Deputy Brannon Jordon was shot as he was taking cover behind a tree after pulling Newbill to safety. He is in serious condition at the hospital. A civilian, whose name hasn't been released, was also shot and is in stable condition at the hospital. The sniper then took cover in the First Presbyterian Church, which is across the street from the courthouse in a residential neighborhood near downtown and Moscow High School. There, he killed the sexton, Paul Bauer, and apparently later took his own life although that hasn't been confirmed. With the church still cordoned of this morning, the congregation met at the music school here on campus, which is actually only a few buildings away from our apartment.
After the call, Carey looked it up online where he watched the press release done this morning as well as read several articles. His sister Lisa called, concerned because she hadn’t been able to get ahold of their parents. Carey was finally able to get through to his father and was informed that they were both all right. Carey’s parents live downtown; only a few blocks from where all of this happened and his father had actually heard the shots. Carey then submitted the story to the BBC news, although I’m sure other concerned citizens did as well. After arriving home later, I also looked at the articles to find out more. I was curious to find out that the officer whom had been killed had also served in the military. At one time, he was stationed ind Grafenwohr and Vilseck, Germany where he commanded an armor company, Bravo Company 2-37 Armor. It’s entirely possible that he was there during the same time as my father and that the two had actually met.
You can read more about it here., as well as watch the press release here. You can read more about Police Officer Lee Newbill here.
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