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| Time | Text |
|---|---|
| I was living in the first time I was going to the shop real quick. | |
| That's when I heard the gun. | |
| I said, you know what? | |
| Let me go see. | |
| Before I go to the shop and that's when I went over and I came back again. | |
| I said, it's at the church. | |
| Somebody's shooting there. | |
| So you were out checking on your shop? | |
| Yes. | |
| Oh, it's a painting body shop where my son works off and on there. | |
| How long have you lived here? | |
| 40 years. | |
| Have you ever heard any gunshots in this area? | |
| Oh, yeah, we hear gunshots because people around here hunt and they go down the river and shoot and, you know, practice targeting, whatever. | |
| But right then, that was not a target because they just kept one right after the other, right after the other. | |
| And I told my wife, somebody's shooting in the neighborhood. | |
| I said, call Wilson County. | |
| And that's when I took off. | |
| And by the time I took off back again, they were already there. | |
| And that's when, you know, I just went back home and I told my wife, it's a shooting in church. | |
| I said, it's bad, and I just left. | |
| How many minutes until you heard it, until you heard the ambulances come in? | |
| Well, when the time I got there, from the time I went back home, probably, I'm going to say 10 minutes, because I went home and I told my wife what was going on, then I went back, and the county was already there. | |
| Of course, they told my wife that somebody was already on the way, so by the time I got there, they were already there. | |
| Did you know anybody that was there? | |
| Where? | |
| In the church. | |
| Well, yeah, a lot of my friends were there, you know, that I know, you know that. | |
| We grew up together and we worked together and stuff like that. | |
| But I haven't talked to him today because of what happened. | |
| But I know him and real good friends of ours. | |
| I know the pastor. | |
| I know his little daughter. | |
| Chris Ward, his little girl passed away. | |
| His little boy is in surgery right now. | |
| But I know a bunch of them. | |
| Mario, do you ask yourself, who would do something like this at a church? | |
| Well, I do all the time. | |
| You know, the world is what it is. | |
| People just don't care no more about nobody. | |
| It's just hatred all over the place. | |
| People just, you know, because everybody got problems and they just stick it out on somebody else or whatever. | |
| People get drunk, whatever. | |
| It's just a cruel world. | |
| And like I tell everybody else, the anti-crisis in this world. | |
| And people don't want to realize that, you know, it's happening. | |
| Father against son, mother against daughter. | |
| It's in the Bible, and it's going to happen. | |
| But a lot of people just put their guard down. | |
| Well, it can't ever happen here. | |
| No, it can't. | |
| It happened here in this little town where everybody knows everybody. | |
| It's sad that it happened, but it happened. | |
| But it's what it is. | |
| All we can do is pray for the families. | |
| And we go to church. | |
| I used to be one of those hill raisers when I was younger. | |
| And I said, I told my wife, you know what, I don't want this no more. | |
| You know, it changed my life from going to church. | |
| I got shot a couple years ago, and that changed my life. | |
| But now I know how it is, that people just don't care. | |
| It's just chaos everywhere you go. | |
| You can't even hear this little time. | |
| You can go out anytime you want at night. | |
| Nobody bothers you. | |
| But now that this happened here, it's in a whole different story. | |
| Regardless, I didn't know that guy. | |
| We didn't even know if he was here. | |
| They said that they seen him here. | |
| I've never seen him. | |
| But it's just things that happen, you know. | |
| I'm sorry, some of us got here late. | |
| You saw the guy? | |
| When did you see the guy and how did that happen? | |
| Well, I just saw the guy going from the store called the deal, but that's all I saw. | |
| I just thought it was a regular guy, little kids, because we always see people around here walking and, you know, that's just, I just thought it was somebody else. | |
| But then when they said it was that guy from the black shirt, whatever, I saw that guy. | |
| What was your last name? | |
| Cavazos. | |
| How do you spell that? | |
| C-A-V-A-Z-O-S. Ma'am? | |
| No, no, I haven't talked to nobody or whatever. | |
| I have my own little girl on my own and I take care of my family and I just told my wife we got some inside and, you know, whatever happened, happened and we'll see afterwards what happened. | |
| How would you describe the person that you saw crossing the street? | |
| Oh, he just had a black shirt on with like a jacket and I don't know if it was dark jeans or... | |
| Black jeans. | |
| It looked like he had a little small backpack on his deal, but he had his head down, you know. | |
| So I just figured he was one of the guys. | |
| They crossed the store, go to the store back and forth, and that's what I thought it was. | |
| What time was that? | |
| I can't really know what time it was. | |
| Around probably 10.30 almost, 10.45, almost 11 o'clock. | |
| Where were you when you saw him? | |
| I was right here. | |
| I was just coming around the block. | |
| Right here, and I turned back. | |
| I got a shop right there, right here, off 87. I was going back to the shop. | |
| And I looked, and I seen him going across the road, but I thought he was one of the kids, you know. | |
| Then they said that was the gunman. | |
| How long was it before then that you heard the shooting, after you saw him? | |
| It was probably like, I'm going to say, seven, eight minutes, because I went home, rushed straight off, went to the house, and we heard the gunshots. | |
| So I came back this way to the church, and that's when the county was already there. | |
| What made you remember him? | |
| Why did you remember him? | |
| I remember him because when I saw that guy in that shirt, You know, I went across the street and I went back home. | |
| Then when I got to the house, I talked to my wife. | |
| That's when I heard the gunshots. | |
| And that's the only guy I saw going across because there was nobody in church. | |
| I mean, there was people in church, but nobody was outside, you know, that I saw. | |
| Was there something about him? | |
| It's just the way, because the way he was walking with his head down and all covered in black. | |
| But I just thought it was just one of the guys, kids that go back across from the church to the store, to this store. | |
| That's what I thought. | |
| When you realize this is... | |
| These are people you know. | |
| These are people you grew up with. | |
| Right, right. | |
| It goes through your head and your heart. | |
| Oh, I feel bad. | |
| I mean, I got a little girl on my own. | |
| Like I said, I've been shot before, and I know how it feels. | |
| I lose a loved one or stuff like that, you know, and it's, there's nothing you can do at the time because, you know, what's happening, the law's there, you just can't do nothing, you know, and I just feel bad for the families. | |
| And like I say, Chris Ward is one of my friends, and his little girl just passed away, and his little boy's in surgery, and I mean, I know it's bad, but, you know. | |
| People just don't think that just because it's a small town, it doesn't happen. | |
| It happens everywhere now. | |
| These days, nothing's safe. | |
| Did you see the neighbor confront him? | |
| They said a neighbor confront him with a... | |
| No, I didn't see that. | |
| After the gunshots had fired and everything, I went home and I didn't come back no more. | |
| After I was in county there, I just went back home and I just told my wife, let it be what it's going to be. | |
| All we can do is pray. | |
| And then they were telling us who got shot and this would happen. | |
| But other than that, I didn't see nobody else. | |
| How do you know it was the guy that you saw? | |
| How do you know? | |
| I don't know what. | |
| I don't know if it was him. | |
| I just, I had the feeling when I saw him, after I went home, I heard those gunshots. | |
| So you're not, nobody has told you for sure? | |
| No, nobody had told me for sure. | |
| And then when I heard on the news that he was dressed in black, whatever, then I said to myself, that was the guy I saw. | |
| This is the only time you see him? | |
| Like, this is the only time you see him? | |
| Yeah, see, no, that was my only time. | |
| Where was that in relation to here and the church? | |
| Yeah, sir. | |
| Where did you see him in relation to here and the church? | |
| Yeah, well, he crossed from the... | |
| Diamond Shamrock towards the church. | |
| I thought it was just a regular one of the kids that go back and forth. | |
| But then after I heard the gunshots, I didn't see nobody else. | |
| And I said, well, that had to be the guy. | |
| Right, right. | |
| Because I went home and I told my wife, those are not firecrackers because that's like 15 shots. | |
| And then they paused and then they did it again. | |
| That's when I came over here. | |
| But the law was already there. | |
| So, you know, I went home. | |
| Do you go to this church? | |
| No, we visit every now and then. | |
| My church was... | |
| River Oaks, Pastor Paul, that's where I go to church. | |
| But we know everybody here. | |
| I'm the person that when they really need the yard, small, whatever, they ain't got nobody to do it for them, whatever, I volunteer and I go cut their yards and stuff like that. | |
| You know, that's what I do around here, you know. | |
| Who are some of the other victims that you're familiar with? | |
| What was it? | |
| Lisa, what was her last name? | |
| McNulty? | |
| Yeah, Lisa McNulty and her daughter. | |
| Margaret Rida is a real good friend of Maggie. | |
| She got shot in the leg. | |
| Like I say, we don't know them all. | |
| Just know them all. | |
| We grew up here. | |
| I've been here 43 years. | |
| We worked together off and on, ranches and hunting and all that kind of stuff. | |
| It just happened. | |
| I don't know. | |
| I just feel bad. | |
| Do you mind repeating your name? | |
| My name? | |
| Mario. | |
| C-A-B-A-Z-O-S. And you said you lived here for 40? | |
| Three years, yeah. | |
| 40, 43 years. | |
| I've been here all my life. | |
| He's a native here. | |
| Cavazos. | |
| Cavazos? | |
| Cavazos. | |
| C-A-B-A-Z-O-S. Have you been contacted by any official agent, like an FBI? No, no, no, no. | |
| And I hate to go because I got a little girl at home and I don't leave her by myself. | |
| My daughter's there with her, but I got to go home. | |
| I got my little girl. | |
| It's my family and I take care of my family. | |
| They got school and that's just me. | |
| If I would have known, I would have answered more questions, but I got my family to take care of, so I got to go home. |
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