At a time when some have moved to defund and vilify the police, officers with the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department are being hailed as heroes for stopping the heavily armed elementary school shooter just 14 minutes after firing the first shots and the department received a 911 call.
In response to multiple requests for disclosure, the Nashville Police Department released bodycam video of the events that unfolded at a Covenant Christian elementary school on Monday morning.
The shooter, a 28-year-old female who in recent years identified as a trans male, killed three children and three adults before being confronted by officers on the school’s second floor.
Surveillance video shows the killer shooting through the locked front doors of the school.
Bodycam video shows a woman directing first responder Officer Rex Engelbert, telling him, “the kids are all locked down, but we have two kids that we don’t know where they are” as he grabs a rifle from the back of his vehicle.
The woman then directs the officer: “At the end of this hall is Fellowship Hall. They just said they heard gunshots down there, and then upstairs are a bunch of kids.”
“Let’s go!” Engelbert calls out. “I need three [officers].”
Moments later, Engelbert unlocked a side door and led several officers into the building.
While searching downstairs rooms, officers heard gunshots on the second floor. Courageously, video shows them sprinting up the stairs.
Less than 30 seconds later, officers used lethal force to stop the shooter.
The heart-wrenching graphic video should be viewed with caution.
Officers Engelbert and Michael Collazo played principle and heroic roles in mitigating the potential carnage the shooter could have inflicted.
Fox News reported that Dave Katz, the CEO of Global Security Group and a former DEA special agent, called Engelbert and Collazo “heroes indeed.”
Investigators have found notes penned by the killer indicating the school shooting “was calculated and planned.”
Covenant Christian School opened in 2001 and serves children from pre-K through sixth grade.
The youth victims are the pastor’s daughter, Hallie Scruggs, and students Evelyn Dieckhaus and William Kinney, both nine years old.
The adult victims are the principal Katherine Koonce, substitute teacher Cynthia Peak and custodian Mike Hill.
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