Oroville Bus Shooting Victim Recounts The Shooting That Killed 1, Injured 4
OROVILLE (CBS13) -- Less than a day after a shooting left one person dead on a Greyhound bus in Oroville and four others hurt, one of the passengers injured was released from the hospital and recounted the incident to CBS13.
The injury on the back of Joshua's head is still visible and he said he feels weak. He was seated in the middle of the Greyhound Bus that pulled in to the stop behind an Oroville AMPM on Oroville Dam Boulevard on Wednesday night on its way to Los Angeles.
Nothing was unusual about the trip, he said, everybody was friendly, including the suspect who has since been identified as 21-year-old Asaahdi Elijah Coleman, a Sacramento resident.
Investigators say Coleman had boarded the bus, which was bound to Los Angeles, in Redding. The bus stopped in Red Bluff and Chico before stopping in Oroville. Passengers reported that Coleman appears to have made or received a phone call that made him agitated and, at some point, he reportedly showed people a firearm he had in his backpack.
"I just felt wet coming down. I got all this blood, then he started shooting some more," said Joshua.
The sheriff's office says a 25-year-old pregnant woman who was shot is in critical condition. A 32-year-old man who was shot multiple times is also in critical condition. An 11-year-old girl is stable, but the severity of her injuries hasn't been released. Joshua, a 38-year-old, suffered minor injuries and was released from a hospital in Chico on Thursday, he told CBS13.
"I figured if I was shot, I needed to let everybody else get off the bus," Joshua said. "I figured I was done for."
He said, at first, he thought he had been punched in the head and stood up to react. That's when he realized he had been shot and was bleeding. He said he fell forward towards the bus driver and his head landed on the lap of a woman, who he said, was also in shock. He said there was, what felt like, a pause before people tried to escape from inside the bus and into the AMPM.
"I guess I got lucky it hit my head and it kind of like, bounded off. It went in and out," said Joshua.
Inside the AMPM, Mary Metoyer was behind the cash register. She filled in on a shift Wednesday night and wasn't supposed to be at work but ended up being a calm in the chaos.
"[Joshua] he came in and he fell down on the ground, he was holding his head, I need to use your phone I need to call my phone I've been shot in the head," said Metoyer.
She said witnesses and passengers to the shooting ran inside the store yelling at her to call 911. They ran into the back of the store in the area that is typically reserved for employees to hide.
"I wanted to freak out, but I knew I couldn't freak out. I needed to stay calm because everybody else was freaking out. I just stayed calm and I did what I had to do," said Metoyer.
She said the witnesses hiding in the back only came out once law enforcement arrived to the scene.
Coleman is set to be in court Friday.