Louisville shooting : Gunman to be tested for CTE as victims’ funerals begin today
Connor Sturgeon will be tested posthumously for Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), his father says
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The gunman behind the Louisville bank shooting will be tested posthumously for Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), his father has said.
Connor Sturgeon’s family have said he suffered from “mental health challenges” but showed no warning signs of what he planned to do before he carried out the shooting at the Old National Bank on Monday.
Funeral arrangements were released on Thursday for most of the five bank employees killed in the massacre, with the first taking place for Tommy Elliott on Friday.
Chilling 911 calls have also been released of terrified bank employees reporting the shooting.
In one of the calls, a woman speaks in hushed tones as she says she is hiding in a closet from the gunman. Multiple gunshots ring out in the background as the dispatcher urges her to “stay quiet”.
Sturgeon’s mother also called 911 saying that her son “currently has a gun and is heading toward” the bank.
Ex-mentor says ‘he never made me feel like he would have done this’
Bank employee Dana Mithcell told CBS that she “knew Connor very well”.
“I was his mentor his first year at the bank. He never made me feel like he would have done this. Not in a million years. He was very kind and soft-spoken. You would never have thought this would have happened,” she said.
She continued: “When I saw him in the hallway with the gun I thought, ‘why would he bring that here to show us?’ It didn’t even register to me he was ready to shoot. Everybody there but one person was in a conference room for a meeting.”
‘We had nowhere to run,’ wounded bank employee says
Dana Mitchell at Old National Bank told CBS that “the only person that was there was in the hallway”.
“I saw him standing in the hallway with a gun and I saw him shoot the person in the hallway. Everyone started running. But we had nowhere to run,” she added.
She recalled that she felt “him shooting me immediately.”
“I just laid down there,” she said. “I tried not to breathe a lot. I didn’t want to move around. I didn’t want him to see me moving or hear me breathing, because I thought he might shoot me again.”
Bank employee rejects ‘rumour’ gunman was fired from bank
Bank employee Dana Mitchell rejected the “rumour” that Sturgeon had been fired from the bank.
“He was not terminated, he was still an employee,” she said. “I don’t know where the rumour came from.”
She said she “never imagined this would happen at my place of work or to me.”
“You see it on TV and it happens to other people but it doesn’t happen to people you know. But this is one of those things,” she told CBS.
VIDEO: Gunman’s mother and co-workers call 911 during Louisville mass shooting
‘Even gun lobbyists and enthusiasts admit [there] might be a problem with gun violence,’ columnist says
White House columnist Brian Karem spoke out on Twitter following the shooting in Louisville – his hometown.
“When I got [the] notification that a gunman had walked into a bank and initiated the 146th mass shooting this year, I immediately called friends and family,” he wrote. “That’s when I found out I knew at least one of the victims.”
“As I crossed the street, I saw three ‘Christians’ standing in front of a wire stand of handouts promoting the Bible,” he added. “A man walking by asked one of them if Jesus ‘would support the right to bear arms,’ and the preacher responded, ‘Of course.’”
“I guess ‘turn the other cheek’ only means ‘turn the other cheek while pulling the trigger of your AR-15.’ I started to feel like my life was unraveling,” he added. “We should all know this is a problem. Hell, even gun lobbyists and enthusiasts admit [there] might be a problem with gun violence. To them, I say: Your way hasn’t worked. Never has and never will. Why not try another way?”
VIDEO: Louisville Mass Shooting: Suspect's family speaks out
Louisville mass shooting: 911 calls reveal mother knew what was happening
The audio of the 911 calls from the Louisville bank shooting has been released, showing that the mother of gunman Connor Sturgeon knew that he was heading to Old National Bank with a firearm and that staff called in hushed tones asking for help from inside the bank during the ongoing shooting.
Those killed in the shooting include Joshua Barrick, 40; Juliana Farmer, 45; Deana Eckert, 57; Tommy Elliott, 63; and James Tutt, 64.
Ms Eckert was among the nine people taken to hospital on Monday before she passed away. Of the eight people who were shot but are still alive, six had been able to leave the hospital as of Wednesday.
Officer Nicholas Wilt, 26, remains in critical condition after he was shot in the head during the shooting.
The gunman was shot and killed by police.
“Transparency is important – even more so in times of crisis,” Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg said in a press release on Wednesday. “Today, we are releasing the 911 calls from Monday’s mass shooting. Parts of the audio have been redacted to protect the privacy of those involved.”
The Louisville Metro Police Department released roughly 80 minutes of 911 calls and emergency responder radio transmissions on Wednesday night. Twelve calls were made to 911 to report the shooting.
Here’s what they show:
Louisville mass shooting: 911 calls reveal mother knew what was happening
911 caller said the gunman was ‘jogging around like he was trying to get somewhere in a hurry’
Louisville bank employee shot by gunman speaks out for first time
One of the wounded employees in the Louisville bank shooting has spoken out, saying that she served as a mentor for gunman Connor Sturgeon and that she didn’t foresee that he may become violent.
Sturgeon shot 13 people during the massacre on Monday at Old National Bank in downtown Louisville, leaving five people dead and eight injured, one of which was bank employee Dana Mitchell.
The gunman was shot and killed by police.
Ms Mitchell told CBS News that she’s on the mend after being shot in the back.
“The bullet went in and out just below the surface,” she told the network. “It was high enough up that it ripped the skin open. It was a wound about 10 inches long. But didn’t hit anything important.”
Read more:
Louisville bank employee shot by gunman speaks out for first time
‘I was his mentor his first year at the bank. He never made me feel like he would have done this. Not in a million years,’ Dana Mitchell says
Louisville bank shooter Connor Sturgeon will be tested for CTE after high school ‘concussions’, father says
The gunman behind the Louisville bank shooting will be tested posthumously for Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), his father has said.
Connor Sturgeon’s family have said he suffered from “mental health challenges” but showed no warning signs of what he planned to do before he carried out the shooting at the Old National Bank on Monday.
The 25-year-old opened fire with an AR-15-style rifle in a first-floor conference room as executives gathered for their morning meeting – all the while livestreaming the massacre on his Instagram account.
Officers responded to the scene within minutes and exchanged gunfire with the gunman, shooting him dead.
Five victims, all executives at the bank, died in the horror attack while others – including a responding police officer – are fighting for their lives in hospital.
The motive remains unclear but new details continue to emerge about the man behind the attack.
Read more:
Did Louisville bank shooter Connor Sturgeon have CTE?
Motive for Monday’s mass shooting remains unclear but new details continue to emerge about the man behind the attack
Kentucky governor describes having to call friend’s wife to reveal he had been killed in mass shooting
Kentucky governor Andy Beshear said he was the one to call his friend’s family to let them know about his death in a mass shooting at a bank in Louisville.
A 25-year-old gunman opened fire at the Old National Bank on Monday morning, killing five people and injuring eight others while live streaming the attack. The shooter, identified as bank employee Connor Sturgeon, entered the bank at around 8.30am armed with an AR-15-style rifle.
He went on a shooting rampage inside the first-floor conference room before exchanging gunfire with responding police officers. The gunman was eventually shot dead by the police.
Governor Beshear described he went to the bank “immediately” after learning about the mass shooting while he was in the governor’s office in Frankfort. He said the shooting took place at the bank where his friends worked and where he was a customer.
The governor was the one to call his friend Thomas “Tommy” Elliott’s wife to inform her about her husband’s death.
Read more:
Kentucky governor describes calling his friend’s family to reveal he had been killed
‘Calling your friend’s wife who is also your friend to tell her that her husband is gone is among the hardest things I’ve ever done’
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