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The Forum Shopping Center in Bend, Ore., Aug. 29.
Photo:
Dave Killen/Associated Press
Bend, Ore.
A 20-year-old male started firing an AR-15-style rifle in the parking lot outside a Safeway supermarket here on Aug. 28. Not satisfied with his violence, he walked inside to continue.
The shooter entered the store and shot and mortally wounded
Glenn Burnett,
84, just inside the entrance. He then stalked through the store, spraying rounds down the aisles as he went. Perhaps he thought he had found an easy target, a place where he could kill with maniacal leisure. If so, he was wrong.
Molly Taroli,
shopping with her husband, pulled her handgun out of her purse and moved to the back of the store, ready to confront the shooter. Her husband ran out the front of the store to retrieve his gun from his car.
Don Surrett,
a 66-year-old Army veteran, was working in the produce section, at the opposite end of the store from where the shooter had entered. Hearing gunshots grow louder as the shooter approached, Surrett hid behind a cart, brandishing a produce knife. When the shooter drew close enough, Surrett jumped him from behind with the knife. The gunman fended him off and shot Surrett dead. But Surrett had distracted, disrupted and possibly wounded the shooter. There would be no killing with maniacal leisure on this day, in this store.
When Bend police arrived at the Safeway two minutes after the first 911 call, they heard shots coming from within. Thanks to Surrett, the shooter knew what he was up against. Bend was fighting back. He had to have heard the police sirens and perhaps even the sound of officers entering the store. Unlike the counterparts in Uvalde, Texas, Bend police entered the killing zone immediately on arriving.
The gunman shot and killed himself.
There would be no standoff. There would be no negotiation. There would, thankfully, be no double-digit body count. Two victims are two too many, but it could have been far worse. Surrett, the Tarolis and the Bend police learned the lesson of Uvalde and took forceful and heroic action to prevent a tragedy from becoming even worse. Faced with evil, Bend resisted like hell.
Would-be mass shooters, who often meticulously study previous shootings, now know that there may be a Don Surrett standing, with whatever weapon is at hand, between them and their diabolical endeavors.
And that’s where the hope, in the wake of this awful tragedy for my city, comes in. When private citizens are willing to fight, to stand in the gap, and when police act decisively and bravely, killers can be stopped. And maybe that will discourage people from becoming killers in the first place.
Mr. Eager, a lawyer, served as mayor of Bend, 2011-13.
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Appeared in the September 10, 2022, print edition.
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