Richard Fierro credited as a hero in Club Q shooting
One of the people being hailed as a hero for stopping the gunman in the Club Q shooting late Sunday night is reportedly a military veteran who was at the club with his wife and daughter.
Richard Fierro of Colorado Springs is a U.S. Army veteran. The stress of the incident and the attention was overwhelming, said his wife Jessica. She feared it was triggering his PTSD.
Fierro, 45, had gone to the club Saturday night with his wife and daughter, who Jessica Fierro identified as the girlfriend of one of the shooting victims, Raymond Green.
"She is overwhelmed to have lost her boyfriend," said Jessica Fierro. Mother and daughter were slightly injured and recuperating at home. The mother described her injuries as bruises.
The family had gone to Club Q together to see a performance by an old friend of his daughter's.
"I have no shame in this. I support my community, no matter who that is," explained Fierro. "We do the pride parade because we love our community. Doesn't matter LGBT, doesn't matter straight. I'm straight. My kids are straight. But we go there. Why? Because of our community."
A New York Times report indicates military records show Richard Fierro left the Army in 2013 as a major.
As the shooting started, Fierro recognized it and the smell of gunfire.
"I just know I got into mode and I needed to save my family. And that was at that time, everybody in that room," he said.
He fell backwards, then got up and went after the gunman, joined by another man identified as Thomas James.
"I grabbed [the gunman] by the back of his little cheap ass armor thing and I pulled him down," Fierro said. "The young man that was sitting there, jumped up with me. I don't know if he helped pull me, pulled him down, I have no idea."
Fierro said it was just gut reaction, but referred to his military past as well.
"That's what I was trained to do," he explained. "I saw him and I went and got him. And when I pulled him down, I told him when I was hitting him, 'I want to kill you guy.'"
Fierro grabbed the handgun away and said he told the other man to push away the AR15-style weapon the man had.
"I just kept whaling on him. And I told the kid in front of me, 'Kick him in his head, keep kicking him in his head,'" he recalled. "One of the performers was running by and I told her, 'kick this guy, kick this guy,' and she took her high heel and stuffed it in his face, or his head or whatever she could hit."
Police who came in took the gunman and Fierro into custody. He spent time in a patrol car as they sorted things out. He said he has no problem with that.
The suspect, 22-year-old Anderson Lee Aldrich was taken to a hospital for treatment and is facing at least 10 charges, including five counts of first-degree murder and five counts of a bias-motivated crime.
Local officials, including Colorado Springs Mayor John Suthers, and witnesses credited Club Q patrons and employees, hailing them as heroes: "In my opinion, and I think the opinion of everyone involved, saved a lot of lives ... I have never encountered a person who had engaged in such heroic actions, that was so humble about it."
Fierro is disturbed and heartbroken by the shooting.
"I used to tell my soldiers, 'let's go. We gotta get on the next patrol. Let's go, we gotta' get out there,'" he said. "Nobody in that building is going to be able to do a next patrol."
He hopes people will be supportive and remember those that were lost and injured.
"I want those five families to know that's all I care about. I want those in the hospital, please get better, just get better," he said. "Use this and shake someone's hand. Give them a hug, give them a kiss. These were good people, man. They were all kids."
