Kaylub Giamanco, the father who fatally shot a gunman at Silver Rail Elementary School in Bend, Oregon, has expressed his sorrow to the parents of the children he could not save. Despite stopping the attack, he said he wishes he had arrived earlier.
Heartbreaking Apology
"I want to apologise for not saving their babies, that's probably the biggest thing for me right now," Giamanco said. "The gratitude for saving people's children is awesome. But there were ones that I didn't save."
Three children, aged 5, 8 and 11, and a teacher were killed when a 16-year-old former pupil, Griffin J. John II, forced his way through locked doors with a shotgun and attacked a special needs classroom. Another student was left in critical condition, and another teacher was injured and taken to hospital.
Acting on Instinct
Giamanco, a 36-year-old carpenter, had dropped his daughters off at the school that morning. Hours later, while driving home for lunch, he saw an individual dressed in black carrying a long firearm. The gunman fired at a pickup truck and a person mowing the lawn, then scaled a fence toward the school.
"Panic fled into my brain," Giamanco recalled. He grabbed a 40-caliber handgun from his truck's centre console and pursued the gunman while calling 911. He told the dispatcher, "I'm sorry I have to go in. People are going to die."
The Final Confrontation
Giamanco crawled across the ground on his elbows as he neared the building. "That's when I started hearing children pleading for their lives," he said. "And then I started hearing gunfire and I just started army crawling faster and faster. And I told myself: 'This is probably the last thing that I'm ever going to do.'"
He entered through a shattered window and saw a teacher struggling with the shooter. "I felt like I was the last line of defense between him and the rest of the children," Giamanco said. He fired, and the gunman collapsed but reached for his shotgun. "He was scrambling for his weapon," Giamanco said. "I looked at him and I shot him two more times to make sure that he couldn't move, because I was afraid of him shooting anybody else."
Recognition and Aftermath
Police confirmed Giamanco was legally carrying his firearm and credited him and the unarmed teacher with saving lives. President Donald Trump praised Giamanco as a "great hero" who "took care of business."
Another teacher, Becky Drury, said she lay on the floor playing dead after a shotgun blast nearly severed her left hand. Giamanco called the unnamed teacher who wrestled with the shooter "a real true hero."
"I can't tell you what it feels like to take a life ... but I can tell you that I genuinely feel like I was supposed to be there," Giamanco said. "If I wasn't there, I just don't know what would have happened."
