Tag Archives: Death

Northern California shooting death toll reaches five after wife’s body found

police sirens

By Alex Dobuzinskis

(Reuters) – The death toll in a shooting spree in rural Northern California rose to five after police discovered the body of the gunman’s wife hidden in the couple’s house, an assistant sheriff said on Wednesday.

The body of the wife of the gunman, Kevin Neal, was discovered late on Tuesday, hidden under a hole in the floor, Tehama County Assistant Sheriff Phil Johnston said.

Authorities believe Neal, 44, killed his wife on Monday, the day before he went on a rampage at multiple sites around the small community of Rancho Tehama, about 120 miles (193 km) north of Sacramento, killing four other people. Neal also opened fire at an elementary school before he was slain by police.

Johnston said many more people might have been killed if staff at the Rancho Tehama School had not locked Neal out. One child there was shot but survived, and others were hurt by flying glass and other debris from the hail of bullets.

“I really, truly believe that we would have had a horrific bloodbath in that school if that school hadn’t taken the action when they did,” Johnston told a news conference.

School employees locked the doors when they heard gunfire in the distance.

The employees ushered children inside from the playground, according to Sacramento television station KCRA, which cited details from the school district superintendent.

Neal, who was driving a pickup truck, rammed open a school gate, before a custodian leaned out from behind a building and distracted him, according to KCRA. Employees finished locking the doors seconds before Neal walked up and opened fire, the station reported.

Neal, frustrated at not being able to enter the school, drove off and was shot to death on the road by police, Johnston said.

Neal was armed with two rifles he illegally manufactured and two handguns registered to someone else, Johnston said, noting that he was prohibited from having firearms under a court-issued restraining order.

Authorities did not discover Neal’s wife had been killed until Tuesday, after Neal shot his neighbors and drove around Rancho Tehama, killing four adults during a 25-minute shooting spree, Johnston said.

Authorities did not provide a possible motive for the rampage and did not identify those killed, citing the need to notify relatives.

On Wednesday, one adult injured in the shooting was hospitalized in critical condition, and a child and three other adults were in stable condition, Johnston said.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles; Editing by Leslie Adler)

Greeks in mourning and disbelief after flood that killed at least 15

Greeks in mourning and disbelief after flood that killed at least 15

MANDRA, Greece (Reuters) – Greeks voiced despair and disbelief on Thursday after a flash flood killed at least 15 people and left hundreds homeless, with many blaming a system that allowed houses to be built on dried up river beds.

In the towns of Nea Peramos and Mandra west of the capital Athens, crumpled cars and mangled furniture lay on roads caked in the thick mud left behind by a raging torrent that smashed through homes on Wednesday morning. [nL8N1NL22V]

“We are ruined. My tavern and my house are gone,” said Paraskevas Stamou, a restaurant owner in Mandra. “Everything is gone, the road is gone, the water is still flowing and we were flooded again last night and this morning.

“We are expecting another downpour tonight. It’s like God hates us,” he told Reuters.

Maria Kriada is comforted outside her destroyed house following flash floods which hit areas west of Athens on November 15 killing at least 15 people, in Nea Peramos, Greece, November 16, 2017. REUTERS/Alkis Konstantinidis

Maria Kriada is comforted outside her destroyed house following flash floods which hit areas west of Athens on November 15 killing at least 15 people, in Nea Peramos, Greece, November 16, 2017. REUTERS/Alkis Konstantinidis

To escape the lethal floodwaters, residents took desperate measures.

“We had nowhere to sleep. We slept on the roof, we found carpets to cover ourselves,” said a man in Mandra whose house was gutted by the flood but remained standing.

Between sobs, his mother added: “Everything went. We don’t have anyone to help us. I don’t have help from anyone.”

Bad weather continued on Thursday. Officials said they were waiting for conditions to improve before giving a clearer picture of the damage. Five people were still missing.

Flags flew half-mast from state buildings and the Acropolis on Thursday as the government declared three days of national mourning.

Newspapers expressed anger. “A Crime,” was the headline in Ta Nea daily, superimposed on a picture of a woman being comforted next to an overturned car. “The Deeds of Man,” wrote the leftist Avgi, referring to unlicensed constructions.

Experts blamed haphazard construction which the natural path for water runoff, and soil erosion on a mountain range hit by fires.

Both towns were built along an old motorway linking Athens to the Peloponnese city of Corinth. As building crept closer to the road, streams that would have drained runoff from the nearby Pateras mountains were blocked.

“Of course the state wasn’t prepared … we cannot compete with nature,” said Christos Zeferos, head of the research center for Atmospheric Physics and Climatology Academy of Athens, adding that climate change meant people should expect more weather-related disasters.

“We should be prepared for more frequent, and different phenomena,” he told Reuters.

Many of the victims were elderly. The youngest was a 36-year old truck driver who called his mother as the floodwaters rose around his lorry. The line went dead soon afterwards.

General aerial view of a flooded area following flash floods in Mandra, West Attica, Greece November 15, 2017 in this still image taken from social media video. NATIONAL AND KAPODISTRIAN UNIVERSITY OF ATHENS/via REUTERS

General aerial view of a flooded area following flash floods in Mandra, West Attica, Greece November 15, 2017 in this still image taken from social media video. NATIONAL AND KAPODISTRIAN UNIVERSITY OF ATHENS/via REUTERS

(Reporting By Michele Kambas, Renee Maltezou, Alkis Konstantinidis and Lefteris Papadimas; Writing by Michele Kambas; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

U.N. pleads for end of Yemen blockade or ‘untold thousands’ will die

U.N. pleads for end of Yemen blockade or 'untold thousands' will die

GENEVA (Reuters) – The heads of three U.N. agencies issued a fresh plea on Thursday for the Saudi-led military coalition to lift its blockade on Yemen, warning that “untold thousands” would die.

The coalition closed all air, land and sea access to Yemen last week following the interception of a missile fired toward the Saudi capital, saying it had to stem the flow of arms from Iran to its Houthi opponents in the war in Yemen.

Yemen already has 7 million people on the brink of famine, but without the reopening of all ports that number could grow by 3.2 million, the statement said.

“The cost of this blockade is being measured in the number of lives that are lost,” David Beasley, Antony Lake and Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the heads of the World Food Programme, UNICEF and the World Health Organization, said in the statement.

“Together, we issue another urgent appeal for the coalition to permit entry of lifesaving supplies to Yemen in response to what is now the worst humanitarian crisis in the world.”

Saudi Arabia has since said that aid can go through “liberated ports” but not Houthi-controlled Hodeidah, the conduit for the vast bulk of imports into Yemen.

For months, the U.N. has warned that the closure of Hodeidah would dramatically escalate the crisis.

“Without fuel, the vaccine cold chain, water supply systems and waste water treatment plants will stop functioning. And without food and safe water, the threat of famine grows by the day,” the U.N. agency heads said in the statement.

At least one million children are at risk if a fast-spreading diphtheria outbreak is not stopped in its tracks, and there is also the risk of a renewed flare-up in cholera, which was on the wane after the most explosive outbreak ever recorded – with over 900,000 cases in the past six months.

“If any of us in our daily lives saw a child whose life was at immediate risk, would we not try to save her? In Yemen we are talking about hundreds of thousands of children, if not more,” the joint statement said.

(Reporting by Tom Miles; Editing by Toby Chopra)

Gunmen shoot dead police officer and family in southwest Pakistan

Gunmen shoot dead police officer and family in southwest Pakistan

By Gul Yousafzai

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) – Gunmen on a motorcycle shot dead a senior Pakistani police officer, as well as his wife, son and grandson on Wednesday as the family was driving in Baluchistan province, officials said.

Two attackers opened fire on the vehicle carrying District Superintendent Muhammad Ilyas and his relatives to Quetta, the capital of the southwestern region, police said.

His four-year-old granddaughter survived and was taken to hospital, they added.

Authorities say there has been a surge in attacks on security officials in Baluchistan, with five suicide bombings and one armed attack targeting police in the past six months.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for Wednesday’s shooting – though Sunni militants and sectarian groups linked to al Qaeda and Islamic State, as well as the Taliban, operate in the region that borders Afghanistan and Iran.

Separatists have also fought a long insurgency there, demanding a greater share of the region’s gas and mineral resources and an end to what they say is discrimination.

Baluchistan is at the center of the $57 billion China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a planned transport and energy link from western China to Pakistan’s southern deep-water port of Gwadar.

(Writing by Saad Sayeed; Editing by Andrew Heavens)

Gunman kills four in Northern California shooting spree

By Dan Whitcomb

(Reuters) – A gunman carrying a semi-automatic weapon and two handguns opened fire at multiple locations across a small Northern California community on Tuesday, killing four people before he was slain by police.

At least 10 other people were wounded, including two children at an elementary school near the small town of Corning, about 100 miles (160 km) north of Sacramento, where the suspect was slain, according to police and local media.

“Deeply saddened to hear of the shooting in Northern California, the loss of life, including innocent children,” Vice President Mike Pence said on Twitter. “We commend the effort of courageous law enforcement. We’ll continue to monitor the situation & provide federal support, as we pray for comfort & healing for all impacted.”

Shots were fired at Rancho Tehama Elementary school where some people were injured there but no students or staff members died, Corning Union Elementary School District administrative assistant Jeanine Quist said.

Tehama County Assistant Sheriff Phil Johnston said at a news conference that the shooter, who he did not name, had been armed with a semi-automatic rifle and two handguns.

The Sacramento Bee newspaper, citing multiple law enforcement officials, later identified the suspect as 43-year-old Kevin Janson Neal, a local resident who had been arrested in February in connection with a stabbing.

Johnston did not give a motive for the shooting rampage. The local Redding Record Searchlight newspaper reported that it began when the gunman opened fire at a home and some six other locations shortly after 8 a.m. PST.

A parent, Coy Ferreira, said he was dropping off his daughter at the elementary school when he heard gunfire.

“One of the teachers came running out of the building and told us to all run inside because there was a shooter coming,” Ferreira told Redding, California, television station KRCR.

Ferreira said he heard gunfire for over 20 minutes and that a student in the room was struck.

Area resident Brian Flint told local media his neighbor was the shooter and had stolen his truck.

Enloe Medical Center in Chico, some 40 miles away, received five patients, three of whom were treated and released, hospital spokeswoman Natali Munoz-Moore said.

St. Elizabeth Community Hospital in the community of Red Bluff received two patients, including one who was stabilized and transferred to another facility, spokeswoman Amanda Harter said.

Mercy Medical Center in Redding received three patients, including one who also was transferred elsewhere, Harter said.

(Reporting by Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Additional reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles and Peter Szekely and Daniel Wallis in New York; Editing by Phil Berlowitz and Lisa Shumaker)

Indonesian police officer killed in shooting near Freeport mine

Indonesian police officer killed in shooting near Freeport mine

By Sam Wanda and Agustinus Beo Da Costa

JAKARTA/TIMIKA, Indonesia (Reuters) – An Indonesian police officer was killed and a second wounded on Wednesday, after both were shot in the back in an area near Freeport-McMoRan Inc’s giant Grasberg copper mine in the eastern province of Papua, police said.

The officers were patrolling an area close to where a Freeport vehicle was targeted in a shooting on Tuesday, Papua police spokesman Suryadi Diaz said in a statement. A helicopter flew the men to a hospital in the nearby lowland city of Timika.

The main access road to Grasberg remained closed, Freeport Indonesia spokesman Riza Pratama said, referring to a 79-mile (127-km) stretch from Timika to the mining town of Tembagapura that runs near a river rich with gold tailings from the mine upstream.

A string of at least 15 separate shooting incidents in the area since mid-August that wounded at least 12 people and killed two police officers has been blamed by police on an “armed criminal group”, but linked to separatist rebels by others.

In a statement, the separatist West Papua National Liberation Army (TPN-OPM), a group linked to the Free Papua Movement, claimed responsibility for Wednesday’s incident.

The group has said it is at war with police, military and Freeport.

EMERGENCY MEASURES

For decades, there have been sporadic attacks along the road where the shootings took place, but authorities’ efforts to catch the perpetrators have been hampered by thick surrounding jungle.

“The Indonesian Military (TNI) and police have urged the Armed Separatist Movement in Papua to surrender, but until now no one has turned themselves in,” Indonesian military chief Gatot Nurmantyo said in a statement.

“Armed separatists cannot be left alone,” he said, adding that reining in such activities was the domain of the military, which was preparing “emergency measures” in case persuasive approaches by the police and military failed.

Papua has had a long-running, and sometimes violent, separatist movement since the province was incorporated into Indonesia after a widely criticised 1969 U.N.-backed referendum.

Foreign journalists have in the past required special permission to report in Papua, and once there, have had security forces restrict their movement and work.

President Joko Widodo has pledged to make the region more accessible to foreign media by inviting reporters on government-sponsored trips, although coverage remains difficult.

(Reporting by Sam Wanda in TIMIKA; Additional reporting by Agustinus Beo Da Costa in JAKARTA; Writing by Fergus Jensen; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

Flash floods kill at least 10 in downpour near Athens

Flash floods kill at least 10 in downpour near Athens

By Vassilis Triandafyllou and Alkis Konstantinidis

MANDRA, Greece (Reuters) – At least 10 people died in flash floods in Greece on Wednesday in the most deadly such incident in recent years when a torrent of red mud swept through towns west of the capital Athens after heavy rain, authorities said.

Torrential rain of this type is uncommon in Greece, where poor infrastructure can leave citizens vulnerable to flooding.

The overnight deluge turned roads in the industrial towns of Nea Peramos and Mandra, about 27 km (17 miles) west of Athens, into fast-flowing rivers and trapped dozens of people in their homes or cars.

Some residents were forced onto rooftops and balconies while cars were thrust onto porches or tipped onto their side. Twelve people were rescued from a bus on a bridge.

“This is a biblical disaster,” Mandra Mayor Yianna Krikouki told state broadcaster ERT. “Everything is gone.”

Heavy vehicles, a bus and cars were stranded under more than a meter of water on a nearby motorway. The force of the water smashed through walls and broke through roads.

In Mandra, five people – two women and three men – were found dead either in their flooded homes or in allotments. Another two were found floating in the sea.

“The walls collapsed, the cars were carried away and they broke everything here. There is nothing left,” resident Marina Kolia said. “Water is everywhere in the house.”

The wall of a local cemetery crumbled and vehicles collided with tree trunks. The fire brigade said at least three people were missing, and an unspecified number of people injured.

Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras expressed regret at the loss of life and called for an emergency meeting with ministers.

Greece has had around a week of heavy rain. A state of emergency was declared in the west Attica region, which includes Nea Peramos and Mandra, on Wednesday.

Both towns, which have a combined population of about 20,000 people, lie in the foothills of a mountain in western Attica. Many Greek housing settlements are built without taking into account town planning regulations.

An Athens prosecutor ordered an urgent preliminary investigation into the deaths and destruction caused and was also investigating possible urban planning offences.

On Tuesday, Greece declared a state of emergency on the eastern island of Symi, just off the coast of Turkey, after a storm swept cars into the sea, damaged homes and cut off electricity and water supplies.

(Additional reporting by Karolina Tagaris and Renee Maltezou Editing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg)

Five dead in California shooting spree that ended at school: local media

police sirens

(Reuters) – Five people died in a shooting spree on Tuesday that ended at a school in a remote area of rural Northern California and some children were among the wounded, according to officials and local media.

Law enforcement officers shot to death the gunman, who was among the five people who died in a series of shootings at seven or more locations, according to Redding, California, newspaper the Record Searchlight.

The shooting spree began at a home and ended at Rancho Tehama School near the town of Corning, the Sacramento television station KCRA reported, citing law enforcement.

The shooter was armed with a semi-automatic rifle and two handguns, Assistant Sheriff Phil Johnston told local media.

A number of students were airlifted for medical care after gunfire at Rancho Tehama School, Johnston said.

Law enforcement did not immediately say what might have motivated the shooter.

Sheriff’s Office officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

Enloe Medical Center in Chico, more than 40 miles (64 km) southeast of the school, received five patients, and three of them were treated and released, hospital spokeswoman Natali Munoz-Moore said by phone. She declined to provide any details on their conditions.

St. Elizabeth Community Hospital in the community of Red Bluff received two patients, including one who was stabilized and transferred to another facility, Amanda Harter, a spokeswoman for the facility, said in an email. Mercy Medical Center in Redding received three patients, including one who also was transferred elsewhere, said Harter, whose company, Dignity Health, runs both hospitals.

Shots were fired at the school and some people were injured at the campus but no students or staff members died, Corning Union Elementary School District administrative assistant Jeanine Quist said by phone. The area is about 120 miles (190 km) north of Sacramento.

California Governor Jerry Brown said in a statement he and his wife were “saddened to hear about today’s violence in Tehama County, which shockingly involved schoolchildren.”

“We offer our condolences to the families who lost loved ones and unite with all Californians in grief,” Brown said.

A parent, Coy Ferreira, said he was dropping off his daughter when he heard gunshots.

“One of the teachers came running out of the building and told us to all run inside because there was a shooter coming,” Ferreira told Redding, California, television station KRCR.

“So we all hurried up and ran and told the students to get in the classrooms.”

Once inside a classroom, Ferreira said he heard gunfire for over 20 minutes and a student in the room was struck.

Brian Flint told local media his neighbor was the shooter and had stolen his truck.

The shooter’s name has not been released.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles and Peter Szekely and Daniel Wallis in New York; editing by Frances Kerry and Phil Berlowitz)

Iran ends quake rescue operations, hungry survivors battle cold

Iran ends quake rescue operations, hungry survivors battle cold

By Parisa Hafezi

ANKARA (Reuters) – Iranian officials said there was little chance of finding more survivors from the earthquake that shook parts of western Iran on Sunday, killing at least 450 people, and rescue operations had now been called off, state television said on Tuesday.

Survivors, many left homeless by the 7.3 magnitude earthquake that struck villages and towns in a mountainous area bordering Iraq, battled overnight temperatures just above freezing and faced another bleak day on Tuesday in need of food and water.

President Hassan Rouhani arrived in the morning in the stricken area in Kermanshah province and promised that the government would “use all its power to resolve the problems in the shortest time”.

At least 14 provinces in Iran were affected by the quake which destroyed two whole villages, damaged 30,000 houses and left thousands of people injured.

Thousands of people huddled in makeshift camps while many others chose to spend a second night in the open, despite low temperatures, because they feared more tremors after some 193 aftershocks, state television said.

A homeless young woman in Sarpol-e Zahab, one of the hardest-hit towns, told state TV that her family was exposed to the night cold because of lack of tents.

“We need help. We need everything. The authorities should speed up their help,” she said.

Television showed rescue workers combing through the rubble of dozens of villages immediately after the quake. But Iranian officials said chances of finding any more survivors were remote.

“The rescue operations in Kermanshah province have ended,” Pir-Hossein Kolivand, head of Iran’s Emergency Medical Services, said.

Iran’s top authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, offered his condolences on Monday and called on government agencies to do all they could to help.

Iranian army, the elite Revolutionary Guards and its affiliated Basij militia forces were dispatched to affected areas on Sunday night.

A woman reacts next to a dead body following an earthquake in Sarpol-e Zahab county in Kermanshah, Iran. Tasnim News Agency/Handout via REUTERS

A woman reacts next to a dead body following an earthquake in Sarpol-e Zahab county in Kermanshah, Iran. Tasnim News Agency/Handout via REUTERS

BITTER COLD

Hospitals in nearby provinces took in many of the injured, state television said, airing footage of survivors waiting to be treated. Hundreds of critically injured were dispatched to hospitals in Tehran.

Iran’s Red Crescent said emergency shelter had been provided for thousands of homeless people, but a lack of water and electricity as well as blocked roads in some areas hindered aid supply efforts.

“People in some villages are still in dire need of food, water and shelter,” governor of Qasr-e Shirin Faramarz Akbari said.

The mayor of Ezgeleh, a city in Kermanshah, said 80 percent of their buildings had collapsed and they desperately needed tents with elderly people and babies as young as one-year-old sleeping in the cold for two straight nights.

In an interview with state television Nazar Barani asked people to send them fuel, milk, water and food as emergency services were too slow and providing limited provisions.

A local man told ISNA news agency that “people are hungry and thirsty. There is no electricity. Last night I cried when I saw children with no food or shelter.”

More than 30,000 houses in the area were damaged and at least two villages were completely destroyed, Iranian authorities said.

Houses in Iranian villages are often made of concrete blocks or mudbrick that can crumble and collapse in a strong quake. Some people are angry that among the collapsed buildings were houses that the government has built in recent years under its affordable housing program.

Photographs posted on Iranian news websites showed rescue workers digging people out of collapsed buildings, cars smashed beneath rubble and rescue dogs trying to find signs of life under the twisted remains of collapsed buildings.

“More people will die because of cold. My family lives in a village near Sarpol-e Zahab. I cannot even go there. I don’t know whether they are dead or alive,” Rojan Meshkat, 38, in the Kurdish city of Sanandaj told Reuters by telephone.

Iran is crisscrossed by major fault lines and has suffered several devastating earthquakes in recent years, including a 6.6 magnitude quake in 2003 that reduced the historic southeastern city of Bam to dust and killed some 31,000 people.

The quake, centered in Penjwin in Iraq’s Sulaimaniyah province in the Kurdistan region, killed at least six people in Iraq and injured more than 68. In northern Iraq’s Kurdish districts, seven were killed and 325 wounded.

A man gestures inside a damaged building following an earthquake in Sarpol-e Zahab county in Kermanshah, Iran. REUTERS/Tasnim News Agency

A man gestures inside a damaged building following an earthquake in Sarpol-e Zahab county in Kermanshah, Iran. REUTERS/Tasnim News Agency

(Writing by Parisa Hafezi in Ankara, additional reporting by Bozorgmehr Sharafedin in London, Editing and Nick Macfie and Richard Balmforth)

In grieving Texas town, faith sustains those left behind

A member of the media walks inside the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs where 26 people were killed one week ago, as the church opens to the public as a memorial to those killed, in Sutherland Springs, Texas, U.S. November 12, 2017.

By Tim Reid

SUTHERLAND SPRINGS, Texas (Reuters) – Joe Holcombe and his wife, Claryce, lost eight members of their family in the Texas church shooting last Sunday, including their son, grandchildren, a pregnant granddaughter-in-law and a great- granddaughter who was still a toddler. But they are serene.

Chairs and roses mark where worshipers were found dead at the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs where 26 people were killed one week ago, as the church opens to the public as a memorial to those killed, in Sutherland Springs, Texas, U.S. November 12, 2017.

Chairs and roses mark where worshipers were found dead at the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs where 26 people were killed one week ago, as the church opens to the public as a memorial to those killed, in Sutherland Springs, Texas, U.S. November 12, 2017. REUTERS/Rick Wilking

“It’s just not a problem to us,” said Holcombe, 86, adding that he and 84-year-old Claryce believe their dead family members are now alive again in heaven.

“We know exactly where the family is, and it’s not going to be long until we’ll both be there,” he said. “And we’re really sort of looking forward to it.”

Chairs and roses show where Joann and Brooke Ward and others were found dead at the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs where 26 people were killed one week ago, as the church opens to the public as a memorial to those killed, in Sutherland Springs, Texas, U.S. November 12, 2017.

Chairs and roses show where Joann and Brooke Ward and others were found dead at the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs where 26 people were killed one week ago, as the church opens to the public as a memorial to those killed, in Sutherland Springs, Texas, U.S. November 12, 2017. REUTERS/Rick Wilking

The Holcombes were upbeat and full of good humor during a telephone interview, and they are not an exception in this deeply evangelical part of Texas.

What is so striking about relatives and friends of the 26 victims of the church shooting in tiny Sutherland Springs is that they all believe good will come from this act of evil and that their loved ones are now safe for eternity, and breathing again, with God.

Psychologists say such deep faith can help families deal with such a ghastly event. Even so, they warn that leaning too heavily on one’s religious beliefs can stunt the natural grieving period and result in post-traumatic stress later.

A cross with a crown of thorns and a Bible open to the book of Proverbs are seen at the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs where 26 people were killed one week ago, as the church opens to the public as a memorial to those killed, in Sutherland Springs, Texas, U.S. November 12, 2017.

A cross with a crown of thorns and a Bible open to the book of Proverbs are seen at the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs where 26 people were killed one week ago, as the church opens to the public as a memorial to those killed, in Sutherland Springs, Texas, U.S. November 12, 2017. REUTERS/Rick Wilking

“I can see potentially it could be some form of denial, a delayed traumatic reaction, and if you don’t have some kind of negative feelings, it can catch up with you,” said clinical psychologist and trauma expert Bethany Brand.

Gina Hassan, a psychologist in northern California, said Sutherland Spring’s faith was invaluable in the wake of the shooting, “but if it’s relied upon in a rigid way, then it’s going to be a problem down the line and come back to bite you later on.”

Local veterinarian George Hill, a relative of the Holcombes, said an evangelical belief in Christ was the only way to deal with such a tragedy.

“We haven’t lost hope,” he said. “They are not gone. They are just gone ahead. And we know we’ll see them again.”

He expressed faith that evil would not prevail. “It looks like evil won, but it didn’t,” he said. “Good is going to win.”

Pastor Mike Clements of the First Baptist Church in Floresville, a small city 14 miles from Sutherland Springs, is officiating over the funeral services for the extended Holcombe family on Wednesday.

The dead include Bryan Holcombe, Joe and Claryce Holcombe’s son, and his wife Karla. Their son Danny Holcombe was killed as well, along with his 18-month-old daughter, Noah. Crystal Holcombe, who was 18 weeks pregnant, was Bryan and Karla Holcombe’s daughter-in-law.

Also shot and killed were Emily, Megan and Greg Hill, three children from Crystal’s first marriage, which had ended with her husband’s death.

Under Texas law, Crystal’s unborn child is also being counted as a victim, making a death toll of nine for the family.

People in Sutherland Springs are truly grieving, Clements said. But evangelicals accept Christ into their lives in a very real way, and because of that, their faith is incredibly liberating, especially at a time of such great tragedy.

Most fundamentally, he said, they believe people who have accepted Christ will go to heaven.

“It doesn’t get any better than this,” Clements said over lunch near his church. “There is nothing better than heaven when you are a believer.”

 

(Editing by Frank McGurty and Lisa Von Ahn)