Deputy Who Lost Family to Gunman Speaks to Reports in Alabama; Students Gunned Down in Germany
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Happening now, violence in peaceful places. A school in Germany and a community in rural Alabama, both torn apart by a gunman's bullets. At least 27 people are dead. And the living are asking why. We have reporters covering both rampages. We will hear from police and witnesses. It's Wednesday, March 11th, I'm Heidi Collins. You are in the CNN NEWSROOM. Police say at least nine students are among the victims in Germany. The attack came in Winnenden, Germany. That's just outside of Stuttgart in southwestern Germany. A former student dressed in military gear targeting a couple of classrooms. CNN's Diana Magnay has been monitoring the situation for us in Berlin. So, Diana, there was a massive manhunt for the shooter. We know that much. Do police have any idea where he may be at this point?</s>DIANA MAGNAY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Heidi, we know now that the man, the 17-year-old former student of this school, who carried out this rampage, has been shot after a 3 1/2-hour manhunt. He has been shot dead about 20 kilometers away from the town of Winnenden where this attack took place. And including him, we now have a death toll from police of 16 people dead. Some of them students, some of them passersby, caught up in the police shootout, which in the end killed the suspect himself, Heidi.</s>COLLINS: Do they have any idea on a motive as of yet?</s>MAGNAY: There is no known motive right now. We know that he was a former student at the school. We don't have a name for him yet. We know that he had commandeered a rifle from his own parents who were legally allowed to carry these weapons and that he'd used that. Gone into the school at about 9:30 a.m. this morning which is when classrooms will be at their fullest, and carried out a horrific school rampage before he then left into the center of town, and then on his -- interestingly, he was supposed to have hijacked -- hijacked a car with a hostage. Taken it out of the town and was then shot by police 20 kilometers away. Heidi?</s>COLLINS: All right. Well, lots of details coming out, obviously. Coming to us live from Germany today, Diana Magnay. Thanks so much for that, Diana. Appreciate it. Quickly want to get to a press conference taking place in Alabama right now. Let's go ahead and listen in. We'll have the latest on the incident that happened there.</s>DEP. JOSH MYERS, GENEVA CO., ALABAMA, POLICE: She's 31 years old. My daughter, Corrine Gracie Myers, she was 1 1/2. Mother, daughter, Ella Kay, she was just born December 1st. She's in the hospital in Pensacola. She's going to have a bullet removed from her leg today. I just don't understand why anything like this would happen. I don't know what to say. I want to thank all the guys I work with. You all did as good as we could do. You did a great job. I want to thank everybody's that's called in with support. Just keep -- keep my baby girl in your prayers. I don't know what else to say. Just be praying for my baby girl. I also have a son who was here at the incident. He's OK. So I got a lot to take care of by myself now. And I don't know what else to say.</s>QUESTION: What about your wife and daughter</s>MYERS: I'm originally from Samson somewhat. I brought -- I met my wife in Kansas, and I brought her here. She's only been living here about a year. She's still new. Her best friends were the neighbors across the street. This is a very tight-knit neighborhood. All the neighbors around here are family. Every day she was up on the porch with my kids talking with the neighbors just like they were family to us. She hardly knew anybody here to even have enemies. She was a stay-at-home mom. We have three kids. You know, she was a super-mom. My baby girl, Corrine Gracie, the sweetest thing in the world. I don't even know how to comprehend what's going on. I just...</s>QUESTION: Did you know the gunman at all?</s>MYERS: I have no idea who the gunman was. I'd seen him at the lab after he had expired. I don't have any idea. I never heard of him. Never met him. Never seen him before in my life. I know he was of some relation to some of the neighbors, but I don't know anything other than that.</s>QUESTION: Was your wife and daughter on the porch? Were they inside?</s>MYERS: My wife and daughter was on the porch, across the street, talking with the neighbors. From talking with some of my other neighbors, the suspect drove up. Fired shots. I don't know what happened from there. I do know that another one of my neighbors, Miss Alina Knowles, did save my baby girl. She ran up on the porch and got my baby girl and took her to safety. Other than that, all the details is still fuzzy. I'm hearing the same rumors you guys are. They've kept me away from seeing them. Come here yesterday afternoon after it happened, they made me leave. So, I -- it's a tragedy.</s>QUESTION: You're trained, in part, to respond</s>MYERS: It goes to show that, you know, we do get trained to handle things like this, but you can't handle something this magnitude. Geneva County has one -- we have very few law enforcement officers. We're not even equipped to handle two people getting killed in a homicide, let alone 10. This is something that is never expected. I don't believe any of us ever trained for it. But, however, I'm so proud of the guys I work with because they did better than anybody I've ever seen. Everybody handled everything great. You know, they're my best friends, and they're my family, and I love them all. And I really want to thank the guys who did everything they could.</s>MYERS: It's tough to even imagine. I cried so much yesterday, I don't have a tear left in me. It still seems like I should be able to walk in the house and my wife should be there and my baby girl should be in there climbing on me. I mean, I'm never in my life going to be able to fully understand it. I mean, just going to have to take it one day at a time. I don't know what to say.</s>QUESTION: Your daughter</s>MYERS: My family and my wife's family lives in Kansas. They're flying down to Pensacola today to check on my daughter. They should be there any time at the hospital, Sacred Heart Hospital in Pensacola. If everybody would please keep my daughter in your prayers. She -- I don't know if she has a bullet wound to the leg or shrapnel to the leg. They got to do surgery to remove it today. It's close to the femoral artery. As far as I've been told she is stable. So, my family's going to check on my daughter. And then they're going to come over here. I've got a lot to handle. I don't know how to handle this situation. I need help from my friends and my family and everybody's prayers. You know. I just don't know what to do.</s>QUESTION: Thank you very much.</s>QUESTION: Thank you, sir.</s>MYERS: Thank you. Thank you.</s>COLLINS: All right. So we have been listening in. Caught in the middle of a press conference that's taking place in Alabama. Just a terrible, terrible incident that happened there. A killing rampage. Southern Alabama, to be specific. We were listening to Josh Myers, whose wife had been killed in this incident. And his child, his daughter, had also been shot. He did say that she is in stable condition asking for the people of Alabama and the country, I'm sure, to pray for her. Again, a bullet wound, in stable condition right now, his daughter. Moving back just a bit to give you an update and the story behind all of this. 11 people in all are dead. And carnage just littered across two counties there in Alabama. Police say Michael McLendon hunted down family members and opened fire at anyone who got in his way. Today that crime scene spans three separate communities now. CNN's Sean Callebs has the very latest.</s>CPL. STEVE JARRETT, ALABAMA STATE POLICE: One of the worst tragedies in recent memories.</s>SEAN CALLEBS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The suspected gunman, Michael McLendon of Kinston, Alabama, police say he started his killing spree near the Florida/Alabama border by shooting his mother and her four dogs. He left the home in flames and from there he took his rampage on the road across southeastern Alabama, firing shots as he barreled down state highway 52.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And he puts five or six bullet holes in the truck. And then he took off.</s>CALLEBS: The shooter, also targeting the family that raised him.</s>JARRETT: Four adults and one child were found shot to death at one residence. One adult was found shot to death at a second residence, and another adult was found shot to death at a third residence.</s>CALLEBS: The county coroner says the victims included McLendon's grandfather, grandmother, aunt, uncle, and a sheriff's deputy's wife and child who lived across the street. Unsuspecting residents, some sitting on their porches, witnessed it all.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I heard about 10 shots, and I saw someone with a gun, and I turned and went the other way.</s>CALLEBS: Then two more people shot and killed apparently at random at a gas station and at Samson Pipe and Supply Store. The horrible tale came to an end at the Reliable Metal Products plant. First he fired a 30-round burst, a police chief shot and wounded, but saved by his bullet-proof vest. Then McLendon went inside and apparently turned the gun on himself.</s>JARRETT: Within minutes shots were heard from within Reliable Metal and law enforcement officers found him dead from what are believed to be self-inflicted gunshots.</s>COLLINS: All right. We have our correspondent, Sean Callebs, on the line with us right now in Alabama, as we continue to learn more about what happened. We are looking at pictures of victims. And Sean, I'm not quite sure if you can see what we are looking at on the screen right now, but I believe these are the family members of Josh Myers who was just at those microphones moments ago. Now he's a sheriff's deputy, right, Sean? And I know that his wife has been killed and one of his daughters -- I believe they have two children, please correct me if I'm wrong -- is in stable condition. And the other child had also been killed, Sean, is that correct?</s>CALLEBS: That's correct. And you're right. That's the deputy holding photos of his children, his wife. Really painful to watch this unfold, because here's a professional law enforcement officer who was actually probably responding to the most serious call he'd ever had in his life, and then to come back and find out that his own wife, his own child, were among the dead, you know, we can all put ourselves in that position. You just can't imagine the agony. He came out very soft-spoken. Talking about what the last 12 or so hours have been like for him. And he -- he and other law enforcement officer actually approached the media just a short while ago, and said he would come out, make a statement and then take questions. And it's just difficult to watch. You know one can't imagine just how painful all of this is. He said he did not know the suspected gunman, however, he did know members of his family. He says here this area of Samson, Alabama, you know, a very small town, 2,100 people. He said people in this neighborhood they all knew each other, and actually his wife and two children were on the porch across the street. That they were on the McLendon's relatives' porch when the shooting happened. So just one of those unfortunate tragedies, if she would have been in the house perhaps the thing -- it may have played out differently. But certainly...</s>COLLINS: Right.</s>CALLEBS: ... just a very difficult time.</s>COLLINS: Completely random at least at this point as far as this other neighboring family is concerned. Very quickly, Sean, and I'm not sure if you have this information or not, but as we look at those two very young children, any idea which daughter is in stable condition right now that Mr. Myers was pleading for everyone's prayers for?</s>CALLEBS: It's my -- you know, I -- the simple answer is I'm not 100 percent sure, so I really want to steer clear of that.</s>COLLINS: OK.</s>CALLEBS: But we do know, you know, that he talked quickly about the fact that a -- the neighbor saw his wounded daughter on the porch, ran up, scooped her off and took her out of harm's way so another perhaps hero in all of this tragedy.</s>COLLINS: Absolutely. All right, well, Sean Callebs, let us know what you learn and we'll come back to you at any time when we may need to do that. Sure do appreciate it. Sean Callebs live out of Alabama this morning. We are following this story all day long right here in the CNN NEWSROOM and as well as CNN.com. You can see interview with the sheriff's deputy, a timeline of the attacks and the latest on this investigation. Once again, you can find all of that at CNN.com.