Military Briefing: 3 Soldiers Fired Shots At Fort Hood

12 killed in shooting at Fort Hood
By SIG CHRISTENSON and SCOTT HUDDLESTON Express-News
Nov. 5, 2009, 5:27PM
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Associated Press

A military briefing at 4 p.m. said three soldiers fired shots at the Soldiers Readiness Processing Center, a complex of several buildings.

Most of those killed were also soldiers, according to the briefing by Lt. Gen. Robert Cone, the post commander. One shooter was killed and the other two were in custody, he said.

Cone said that local police responded relatively quickly and killed one of the shooters. He said he believed that one Fort Hood civilian police officer was among the dead. Fort Hood has contract and military police, he said.

"This is a terrible tragedy," Cone said.

ABC News identified the dead assailant as Maj. Malik Nadal Hasan of Virginia.

A defense official speaking on condition of anonymity told the Associated Press that Hasan was a mental health professional — an Army psychologist or psychiatrist.

It was not known whether he was treating people at the base.

Officials says it was not clear what Hasan’s religion was, but investigators are trying to determine if Hasan was his birth name or if he may have changed his name and converted to the Islamic faith at some point.

Cone did not speculate about a motive, but the Army released a statement saying it did not believe the shootings were an act of political terrorism.

"Its difficult enough when we lose these brave Americans in battles overseas. It is horrifying that they should come under fire at an Army base on American soil," President Barack Obama said at a Tribal Nations conference at the Department of the Interior.

Obama asked all Americans to keep Fort Hood in their thoughts and prayers.

Earlier in the day, there were conflicting reports inside and outside the post on the number of assailants and whether they were all in custody.

The base was on lockdown.

Fort Hood spokesman Sgt. Tim Volkert said the shooting occurred at 1:30 p.m. "Right now on Fort Hood they’re just telling people to stay at home or to stay put and the homes and day care facilities on post have been locked down as well," Volkert said.

Maria Treviño, who works at Carl R. Darnall Medical Center, said she was on the phone with a woman at the processing center when the shooting occurred. She said she heard screaming and gunshots before she hung up to get help.

"They just started screaming, ‘Don’t let him in, don’t let him in, they’re shooting at us,’" she said. "I pray they didn’t get hurt. It was horrible. We’re still scared over here."

Treviño said soon after the phone call she began to see bloodied victims stumble into the hospital. She said authorities have not let anyone who works at the hospital leave.

An online message at 3:06 p.m. from a person who lives on Fort Hood stated she was "locked in my post housing. scared. dont know where the shooters are." A few minutes later, the sender, whose MySpace page indicates she is the wife of a soldier, wrote, "all i hear are sirens telling us to stay indoors. can’t hear any gunfire. the PX is up the road from my house though."

Killeen ISD spokeswoman Leslie Gilmore said the district has nine campuses on Fort Hood, including seven elementary schools and two middle schools. All were on lockdown. Most of the elementary schools have after-school programs, so there were still children on those campuses. No buses were going in or out.

Texas Education Agency spokeswoman Debbie Ratcliffe said her agency had received information from an administrator with the district, who also said no Killeen ISD staff or students were involved in the shooting and that both shooters and victims were in uniform.

C’Lina Sabillon, a Killeen school teacher and wife of a soldier at Fort Hood, said everyone in Killeen is on pins and needles. She said she just spoke briefly an hour after the shooting with her husband, Staff Sgt. Jorge Sabillon, who said he was OK but was still on the post and had to get off the phone.

"If he had said ‘I’ll be fine,’ then I’d feel better," she said. "But I’m worried about my husband, and I’m worried about my students. A lot of them have parents in the military."

Sabillon, whose brother, Sgt. Michael Barrera, was killed in Iraq in 2003, said today was an early release day at Eastern Hills Middle School in Killeen, where she works as a sixth-grade reading teacher. The students were released from classes at 1:35 p.m., roughly the same time the shooting occurred.

The teachers were supposed to have an administrative meeting in the afternoon. But after the principal announced breaking news that seven had died in a shooting on the post, she let the faculty go home for the day.

"She could see by the looks on our faces there our minds were not there," she said. "Everyone here in Killeen has been rushing to go home, and listening to the radio, watching the television and going on the Internet, trying to get information."

Sabillon’s mother in San Antonio, Hilda Guardiola, was relieved that her daughter and son-in-law were unhurt. Her niece, also a teacher, was at an elementary school in Killeen that was on lockdown.

"They’re not sure when they’re going to let everyone go," Guardiola said.

Sharon Pinto, a postal clerk and officer worker at a grocery store about 4 miles from Fort Hood, was still waiting to hear back from her daughter about her son-in-law, a captain who recently returned from a tour in Afghanistan.

“She said she’d call me back and let me know,” said Pinto. Two and a half hours after the shooting, she still had not heard back.

At her store, and several others, rumors were flying in the immediate aftermath of the shooting.

“Everybody’s on their cell phones talking,” said Pinto, who first heard about the shooting from a customer.

“It’s quite a shock,” she said.

Killeen depends on the base for its economic survival. It’s a city where everyone seems in some way associated with the Army.

Though he had not yet learned the identity of the suspects, Killeen bicycle shop worker Wes Neveu said the shooting didn’t surprise him — not when soldiers are constantly coming in and out of combat.

“Cmon, you send these guys over there, for 13, 16 months, you let them come home for three months, six months, and send them right back,” said Neveu, a veteran himself, who survived a shooting in a mess hall while he was stationed in Germany years ago. “For the past two or three years, all these guys have known is getting shot at or shooting other people.”

Pinto agreed.

“They’re not getting enough counseling. They’re just throwing them back into society, and I don’t think they’re getting all the help they need. Then they wait six months, and they send him back again,” Pinto said. “I think it’s just too much, too much for the families, too much for the soldiers.”