Dreadful Shooting at Safeway in Oregon Kills 2 People

On Sunday the 28th, a gunman walked into a Safeway in Bend, Oregon. The Bend police said that the gunman began “spraying shots” and killed 2 people.

The shooter was a 20-year-old named Ethan Blair Miller. Ethan lived behind the Safeway at Fox Hollow Apartments. What would put such a thing into a young man’s mind to burst into a grocery store and kill people? Bend Police still don’t know the reason for his doing. The Bend Police Department spokesperson, Sheila Miller, said, “We have no evidence of previous threats or prior knowledge of the shooter. We received information about the shooter's writings after the incident had taken place and the shooter has no criminal history in the area."

Ethan killed 2 people and injured 2 others that night. According to The Bulletin, Ethan “fatally shot customer Glenn Edward Bennett, 84 years old, of Bend.” Moments after this incident, a Safeway employee, Donald Ray Surrett Jr., took things into his own hands as he “attacked and tried to disarm him but was shot and killed,” according to CNN News. Sheila Miller said, “Mr. Surrett engaged with the shooter, attempted to disarm him, and may very well have prevented further deaths. Mr. Surrett acted heroically during this terrible event,” The Bulletin reported. According to CNN News, “Police responded to the Forum Shopping Center around 7 p.m., authorities said. Rushing in, they could hear gunshots, then discovered the shooter dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.” It was another horrifying American shooting that took place in Bend, Oregon.

Rob Segers is a security guard here at Palisade High School. Segers had some things to say about the shooting, as well as public shootings in general. Segers commented, “I don’t know the specifics. I know there was a shooting that started in the parking lot and moved inside.” When asked how they approach a public shooting, Segers said, “We want to respond as quickly as possible. Fortunately, we haven’t had a public shooting of that scale here in the town of Palisade in a really long time. The Palisade Police Department is committed to making sure everyone is safe and that we do what we can to help prevent gun violence. We encourage people to report everything they see that might include suspicious activity so we can check it out. In that way, we can try to prevent these things from happening, rather than having to respond to them.” Segers proceeded to say, “We take it very seriously. Our biggest goal is prevention, rather than response. We train for these things because we want to be ready. Our primary goal is to prevent these sorts of things from happening before we have to respond to them.”

Public shootings can be very dangerous and horrifying. So in case you are ever in the situation of a public shooting, you know what to do. Grab your cell phone and dial 911.