Let's clear up the story brain and show the truth......something you are sadly unfamiliar with ....
Zamudio’s Experience
“It was Saturday,” Joe began. “I didn’t have to work, so I went to have breakfast with my mom. On the way back, I went to Walgreen’s. Walking up to the door, I saw a crowd of people (at the rally), and went in to get cigarettes before seeing what was going on. As I was asking the lady behind the counter for a pack of Camels, I heard one shot, then a chain of shots real fast, before she could hand me the cigarettes. It sounded like fireworks. I just responded and ran out door. As I cleared the door, a man in front of me who had been wounded in the leg said, ‘Shooter! Shooter! Get down!’”
Zamudio had long kept a gun in his car. The previous August, when buying a Ruger P95 9mm, he had learned from the gun dealer that Arizona had legalized permit-less carry, and from that day on had worn the Ruger constantly. Left-handed, he was carrying it that day, butt forward in the inside right breast pocket of his jacket, fully loaded with 16 rounds.
Zamudio continued, “I reached into my pocket, put my hand on my pistol, took the safety off, and ran down the sidewalk (toward the shooting scene). That’s when I saw a group of people wrestling with (Loughner). The first thing I focused on was the man closest to me. His back was to me. He raised up with a Glock in his hand, open, magazine sticking out. In that second I decided that because the gun was open, I didn’t have to shoot him. I immediately grabbed him by the wrist, turned the gun in toward him, told him to drop the weapon. He did.
“Even as he was dropping the gun, everyone yelled, ‘It’s not him, it’s not him!’ I said, ‘Put it down.’ I was hearing people yell, ‘I’ll kill you, you motherf***er, I’ll kill you.’ When the man dropped the gun I said, ‘Put your foot on it, make us all feel safe,’ and he did. This turned out to be Roger Sulzgeber, one of my personal heroes. He and Bill Badger had grabbed Loughner and pulled him to the ground. Apparently the gun had jammed, either misfired or didn’t feed, and Loughner was trying to reload again when they grabbed him. There was an empty mag on ground, a full one that mis-fed in the gun, and another full magazine Patricia Maisch got away from him.”
Killer Restrained
“The world went into slow motion,” Joe continued. “I assessed the situation. Bill had Loughner by the neck on the ground. Roger stood on the gun and leaned over and grabbed Loughner’s shoulder, holding him down. Patricia had been on the ground when she grabbed the loaded magazine away from him, and she shimmied over his legs. Loughner began to struggle, and Patricia asked me to take her place. I got down onto the back of his knee and put a hand on his hip. A fourth gentleman put a foot on his back, he wasn’t going anywhere. I tried to call 911 but couldn’t get through, tried three times. The police showed up in about four minutes. All Loughner ever said during that time was, ‘Ow. You’re breaking my arm.’”
Joe adds, “Bill Badger was bleeding profusely from his head. He told me as Loughner was shooting everyone, (Loughner approached him and) pointed the gun at Bill’s head. Bill reflexively turned his head away, and when Loughner fired, the bullet took skin off down to the skull but did no real damage. Bill went down. When the gun stopped firing, Bill raised back up and Loughner was right in front of him. That was when the wrestling started. Bill Badger was bleeding, the first real blood I saw, and it hit me that this had really happened, all these people got shot. The enormity of it set in.
“I looked to my right, and saw a sea of wounded people. Between them and their loved ones and everyone else trying to help, there were just so many people. Many people were screaming different things at once. ‘Call the police!’ ‘Oh, my God!’ ‘Where’s the ambulance?’ People say crazy things to deal with the trauma. One person yelled, ‘Take a picture of his face!’”
The Cavalry Arrives
Zamudio remembers, “The lady from Walgreen’s came out and did CPR on one victim. There were four different doctors at or near the scene who were able to provide immediate care. The first law enforcement to show up was a uniformed officer, a minute ahead of everyone else, and he got out of his car with gun in hand, looking at us. People were shouting ‘He’s right here, he’s right here.’ A lady tried to give the officer the empty magazine.
“Instead, he went straight to Loughner, cuffed him, and when the second officer arrived, they searched him. I watched them take two regular magazines, a Ziplock baggie with cash, and a folding knife from him. No phone, no ID, no keys. At that point I couldn’t believe he had a knife the whole time. If he’d gotten to it, it would have been another set of problems.”
Aftermath/Afterthoughts
Joe was prepared to stop the killer with gunfire if he had to. He says today, “I was just truly blessed I didn’t have to pull my firearm. I didn’t have to go to that place. The guy who had the gun was the wrong guy, and I’m glad I didn’t pull a gun on him. I’m glad the people took him down when they did. He was heading in my direction, toward the Walgreen’s, coming my way; when I stepped out the door I might have been the next victim, or would have had to shoot him.”
He adds, “It was the most intense five minutes of my life, hands down. You can’t be prepared to see the dead bodies and the wounded people. Some of the dead lay there for the two hours the police kept us there, covered with shirts and jackets. Some they worked on and took away. There were many people with superficial wounds: ‘My arm’s bleeding,’ ‘My back is bleeding.’”
Joe found the police response to him very reasonable when they learned he was armed at the scene. He relates, “Starting that day, (it’s been) crazy ever since. I never thought about it. I take my gun with me because I might need it to protect myself. I had never thought about the other things that might be involved. The police were very cool. The investigating officer took me aside, and we went through what had happened three or four times. When it was over he said, ‘Thank you, have a nice day,’ and let me get in my car and drive away.” Joe’s gun was never taken, never came out. He explains, “I told the first policeman that I didn’t want to scare anyone, but I was carrying a gun, in my coat pocket. Did he want it? He said no, tell the investigator. Another officer asked me to stand separately, that was it. When the investigator asked to see my gun, I opened my coat and showed him where it was, and he said okay. That was it.”
