Richard M. Fierro served 15 years in the US Army. In 2013 he left because the psychological and physical strain of traveling to Iraq and Afghanistan had become too great.
On Saturday, 9 years later, the instincts of the four trips took over, he says in an interview with New York Times. It may have saved many lives.
Fierro says he was at Club Q, a queer nightclub in Colorado Springs, with his family when alleged perpetrator Anderson Lee Aldrich (22) shot and killed five people. The 22-year-old is now being charged with murder and a hate crime, he writes ABC News.
THE SCENE: It was here, in this strange nightclub, that a man rollerbladed and killed five people on Saturday. Photo: Reuters/NTB
sea View
Throwing himself at the executioner
Fierro was sitting at a table with family and friends watching a drag show when the gunman fired the first shots.
Now Fierro tells his story from the disco. A description of the facts that fits well with what other witnesses from the dramatic minutes have told.
Fierro threw himself to the ground when he first heard the shots. He then saw the perpetrator move across the venue and into a room where many of the guests had fled.
– I don’t know exactly what I did, I just entered battle mode. I just thought I had to kill him before he killed us, Fierro adds New York Times.
He then ran up behind and tackled the shooter to the ground and an intense fight ensued between the two.
– I took the gun out of his hand and started hitting him on the head, again and again, says Fierro.
Another man then kicked the offender’s automatic weapon out of reach and one of the dancers began kicking the offender with his high heels.
The two brawled until Aldrich gave up resisting.
These have been killed
Colorado police released the names of the five killed on Monday.
Kelly Loving, Daniel Aston, Derrick Rump, Ashley Paugh and Raymond Green Vance all lost their lives in the tragedy. Both Rump and Aston worked as bartenders at a night club CBS News.
Fierro’s wife Jess confirms to Reuters that Raymond Vance was her daughter Kassy’s boyfriend.
“Too often the community loses track of the victims of these sad and tragic events,” Colorado Springs Police Chief Adrian Vasquez said at a news conference Monday afternoon.
He also confirmed that the two heroes who stopped the perpetrator were Richard Fierro and Thomas James.
“He saved a lot of lives,” Colorado Springs Mayor John Suthers said of Fierro.
In addition to the five deaths, 17 people received gunshot wounds in connection with the incident.
