How To Stop A School Shooting

her story, but I think you should. Molly is a recipient of the Citizens Medal of Honor, which was first awarded in two thousand and eight to recognize ordinary Americans whose actions quote epitomize the concept of service beyond self, above and beyond their call of duty, whatever it may be. In Molly's case, her duty was as a guidance counselor at Sycamore Middle School in Tennessee, where in twenty sixteen, she came face to face with the potential school shooter

and managed to talk him out of it. Through the course of the conversation, you'll hear in Molly many of the qualities we've tried to highlight in this series so far, faith, humility, dedication to service, and an incredible ability to think quickly under pressure, and of course, courage.

do it. I taught fifth grade, sixth grade, and seventh grade math, language, Arts, science, social stay all four subjects over the course of that one semester, and by the end of it, I just loved the school so much. I didn't think I could leave. I knew the kids would come and go, but the staff probably would. And that is so true of the culture here. I mean, our principal has never worked She's going to be starting her thirtieth year here at Sycamore, never works anywhere else.

Our assistant principal has only worked in our county twenty five years. I've only been here, you know. So people tend to come here and stay, and that is such an important piece I think of our story is the culture that we have. People are very embedded.

remember that day vividly. I went home, and that was when we had just started having twenty four hour news coverage and you could watch it all day long, and I was I was just fascinated, not by I think a lot of the details that most of the general public wanted to know about the specific situation, But what I couldn't write my mind around is how could two boys create a plan of this magnitude over a year's

time and nobody know about it? And so I started researching, literally just googled anything that I could find about mass shootings that had happened on school campuses. I read every book. I think I own every book that's been written about a school shooting all because in my mind, I thought, if I could, what if we had a kid like that here at school? What if he was in my class? Would I be able to recognize that child was in trouble? Is there?

you looking into so much of this? And I think in hindsight, I mean, I even tried to find specifically writings that were taken from at the time those two particular attackers at Columbine, because I felt like, if I want to find a kid like this, I'm going to have to understand them, and I'm an English teacher. Most of what is going to come out would possibly come through writings that they would do in class, and so

that started the path. I spent ten years doing that recording, writing down, taking notes on everything that I knew, and I went to our director's schools and so listen, there's only eighteen school counselors in our county, but we don't really have many trainings that are geared toward what we do. You know, is it possible that I could, because by that point I'd moved to the counseling department. You know, is it possible for me to do a training? I've

written one. It's called Recognizing Red Flags an Educator's Role in Preventing School violence, and it was an in depth psychological analysis of about thirty school shooters. So I think that God was preparing me in a mighty way. He gave me eighteen years of talking to kids, both in classroom settings and individuals, and he gave me all this content knowledge that I had learned about psychopathy. I'd learned

about psychosis. I've learned about even hostage negotiations and things that most people wouldn't just know in their average lives. I'd spend a great deal of time fully enmeshed in this topic. For reasons I didn't understand, and to be quite honest, my family was concerned about that. You know, why would I be so focused on this? And I would just always say, I'm not sure, but I just feel like I have to know as much as I can.

looked at writings taken from the attackers at Columbine. Several of those things were things they wrote for class assignments, and so I think I started realizing if kids are writing about violence, especially if it's connected to prior events or prior people in history who committed atrocities, then I needed to pay attention. Those all became red flags.

reading so much about this. I really thought that the intention. I really thought that God's plan was just for me to have a passion that I could go and talk to other people about, to try to convince them of importance of not just school safety, but of mental health and in brain health. And I wanted people to pay

attention to kids who were struggling. I felt like there were a lot that had flown under the radar that I had probably missed, you know, as a teacher and becoming a counselor could see more of just in their faces and their words that they were struggling, so that that could bring them in then, you know, and have those conversations. So I don't I never really thought that that would happen here, But in the moment when I realized what was going on, I did have a flash

before my eyes. It was you know, people talk sometimes about if you're going to pass away, sometimes your life will flash before your eyes, But for me, it was not that. It was a flash of all these things I had read and researched, and I remember thinking, you know, I was kind of like Noah, and I was trying to build an arc and nobody had ever seen it rain. So people didn't really want to talk about school violence.

They just it was kind of the head and the sand mentality that if we just pretend that it's not going to happen, or we don't talk about it, we're not going to invite it in. And so I sat there on those moments when I realized how serious this was and thought for such a time as this, And you know, Esther is one of my favorite characters in the Bible, and I remember thinking, wow, Lord, you know of all the hundreds, you know, of thousands of schools,

and probably as many kids are more. You know, you brought that kid to Sycamore Middle School, and you you brought him to me. And it's like, all of a sudden, I had this moment of like, this is why. And I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe it. I still can't, as you can tell, obviously, I still stand in all of that.

will not be dressed for it. So I wasn't, you know, And I thought I was just going to be here. I knew the kids wouldn't care what I had on. I'd be sitting behind my desk all day. It was a comfortable skirt, but it was the black and white palm tree printed skirts, and like I said, I didn't even really like it, but it was eight dollars, so I bought it. I have three of them.

going on? So I jumped out of the car kind of started moving toward the kids and realized that September twenty eighth of twenty sixteen was National cu at the Pole Day, the one day a year student so choose they can gather at the base of their school's flagpole

for prayer. And so my intention was to run in here, throw my things down behind my desk, and run back out to supervise, because you leave very many middle school kids alone for very long, and something's going to happen that's going to require a lot of paperwork on the part of an adult. And so I just thought i'd

run out in supervising. And that was just never meant to be because while I was here, standing here from from my things down, glanced at my calendar, this young man came in and and I had met I recognized him immediately because I just met with him the friday before. I remember when he came in, I realized his defenses were way up. But I also realized pretty quickly I'd

never seen that kid before, and that bothered me. And I said, hey, you know, I don't think we've met, and so I kind of introduced myself and and I said, you know, I understand your you're kind of new to our school. And he said, you know, yes, ma'am. I came in last year and I said, okay, well that that kind of explains that, you know, and we're newly into this eighth grade year, so it just hadn't met him, and so I just I just told to me, I just thought maybe we could kind of check in see

how things are going. And he sat down right across from my desk here I had two brown chairs. I've learned that some kids, if they talk to you, they want a barrier between you and them for comfort purposes. Other kids, I have a chair that sits right beside my desk because some of them they want their needs to be touching yours. They're fine with being close to you.

And so he had sat down across from me, and we had just kind of started talking, and then all of a sudden, it was kind of like the damn broke and there were all these things in his life that I felt like he'd been holding on to that he just let pour out and I kind of just skooted back in my chair and let him talk. And

he did. But one of the things that inside of me, in hindsight, was another red flag that was raised, was the fact that he was telling me this story that I knew aspects of it were most likely not possible, but there was just enough of it that some of it could have been probable. And I remember writing some notes on the sticky note because this was a Friday, and I thought, I'm going to look these things up over the weekend and see if this is even possible.

But what really struck me was, I think this kid believes this story. You know, he's weaving this together, and I think he'd believes.

it that just did not seem possible. But what fascinated me was I thought, I think this kid believes what he's telling me, and I think he believes that I believe him, And so obviously I was concerned, so and of course I learned a lot about psychology that I

would not have known otherwise. I've read the works of doctor Peter Langman, who is considered to be one of the world's leading experts on mass s sheotings that happened with teenagers, especially in school environments, and doctor Langman's work was crucial to me in the moments that this was happening, because I was able to recognize, based on all of these other case studies, what I believed was a psychosis or psychoses in process, and began to learn a very

valuable lesson that day that reality is really about perspective. It doesn't really matter what's real, It only matters what people perceive to be real. And so in these moments with this child, it became crucial for me to accept his reality. And I do remember praying you know Lord helped me to not get lost in this. But I had to try to meet him where he was. We use those words a lot, and meet the child where

they are, and that was very important. I don't think that that piece would have occurred had I not had all this background research. So he talked for forty five minutes and I remember thinking, he's missed an entire class period. I've got to get him back to class. And so I said to him myself, listen, you have you know, you've really unburdened a lot today, you've shared a lot.

Would you like to come back maybe one day next week and then we can meet again and talk and and he he said yes, he would like to do that, and so I wrote his name on my list.

the outliers. They are not on the radar of anyone. Sometimes they are, but a lot of the times they're not. And that is because if someone is suffering from a psychosis, they can be psychotic in one way and function perfectly normally in many other ways. They can hold jobs, they can come to school, they can do work, they can

participate in class discussion, they can have friends. A lot of them become very good, especially the older, they get at covering up what they perceive to be taboo behavior, and I think that some of the things that he was experiencing, he was testing the waters with me to see how I would react that Friday, to see if I would react strongly, or if I would say, you know, well, that's not possible, or if I would question what he

was saying. And I didn't, And that, to me was another crucial piece, because you know, you fast forward to the next week, we come back on Monday, I had this running list of kids to see. We try to see them in the order that they request to see them, kind of like they've taken a ticket, unless obviously it's a crisis situation that then involves us to bump them,

you know, to the front of the line. But I never got to him on Monday, and then on Tuesday, I was in classroom guidance with eighth graders all day long, and so Wednesday morning I just hadn't gotten to him yet. But that's okay, because he came back.

your teacher, you let me know. And he said okay, and he left, and I just thought, well, I hadn't gotten him yet, but when they come back again, you usually bump them up higher on the list, and so I thought, I'll see him first thing this morning at ten thirty. And so then I went about my morning duty. I mean, it's eerie in some ways to watch myself on surveillance video. I'm walking through the hallways of the school.

I stopped and straighten the lanyard of one of our eighth grade teachers I'd worked with for twenty years, never thinking at all that anything's wrong. I mean, I'm coming back to the counseling department, and I'm almost skipping because I know that Glenn, my co counselor, has prepared breakfast

and we're gonna eat and talk about our day. And I was in Glenn's office, which is adjacent to mine, with my back to the door, when the young man came in and I noticed he was there because Glenn looked up from his plate and he said, well, hey, son, you know what can we do for you? And I heard the kid say I was supposed to meet with Miss Hudgens at ten thirty, but I don't think I

can wait until then. And I remember looking at Glenn and almost like rolling my eyes, and I was thinking, oh, my goodness, my breakfast is going to be cold, and then thinking that that was kind of selfish, and just turning and smiling and saying, well, hey, honey, that's okay. You just head on over to my office and I'll

be over there in a second. And so I remember like wolfing down, you know, the rest of breakfast, and dropping the dishes in the sink and coming in and closing the door and just walking around and sitting down right here and just saying, well, hey, babe, what's going on, which is how I usually start all of their conversations. And then pretty quickly I realized something was different. His mannerisms,

his facial expressions seemed different than the week before. And I think the reason that I really recognized this was my body reacted. First, my heart rates started to pounds. I remember thinking that I could hear my pulse in my ears, and I thought, I don't think my heart sounds like this when I'm running, you know. And then I felt like somebody took a cup of something warm and like poured it on top of my head, like

it was running down my body. And I remember even saying to myself, like kind of steadying myself at the desk and saying to myself, Molly, don't faint. He was looking around the room, eyes kind of darting in different places. He seemed very nervous, which was nothing like the way he had appeared the week before. And then he started to ask me a series of questions that obviously spiked my level of concern. He started asking if, then questions, if I do this, what are you going to do?

They were terrifying, and I remember thinking, play dumb, and so I remember saying, well, honey, I don't know what I would do, but why would you do that? And frantically I start thinking about what my options are because in that moment, I just had this thought, and I think the Lord gave it to me. It was he's got a gun. And then I start I remember praying.

I remember saying, Lord, if there's anything separating you from me, take it away, because if this is it, if I'm going to die today in my office, you know, in this tress skirt I don't like the day before I turned forty, I want to know where I'm going. I want to know I'm okay. I remember saying, take care

of my boys and help me be brave. I mean, it was a thirty second prayer probably, And then I start trying to focus on what he is saying to me, and all the while I'm thinking about the teachers who were right across the hall. I remember thinking about about the number of students they had. I knew their backs would be to the door, and for some reason in my mind, I thought that's where he'll go first. There'll

be his first victims. And it dawns on me the only thing standing between him and them is me, and I remember thinking, you got to do everything you can, like you got to do everything you can. So I start really listening to what he's saying. He would go back to rehash some of the things that he had been so concerned about the week before. All the while I am frantically trying to think about what I will do if I can get this gun. Can I just

pull the trigger and unload it into the ceiling? I remember, you know, but I remember looking up here and thinking, we have a drop ceiling. It's a steel roof. This building was built in nineteen seventy eight, and I had read a lot. I knew what the trajectory of bullets would do inside of a cinder block room, and I remember thinking that that's not going to work. And I had this thought, you're going to talk your way out

of this. And I remember thinking, you know, for a kid who spent a whole lot of time in trouble in elementary school because I just couldn't seem to stop talking, yet had gotten a job where I talked all day, it worked out great for me, right, And so I just remember thinking, you don't have to talk yourway eye this. At one point in the conversation, he unzips his jacket and he sticked his he stuck his hand inside of it, and I knew, I knew what it was. And he

started tapping on something. And I say this all the time when I tell our story. Something rose up in me and I remember thinking, not my school, not my school. This will not happen here. This will not I will kill you or you will kill me. But you're not leaving that room. And I'll tell you I had never thought about harming anybody. I mean, I'm a counselor what we want to help people. That's not ingrained in our

in our DNA. But in that moment, if it was going to be him or those kids, or him or one of those staff members, or him or me, it was going to be him. There was no way he was going to leave this room. I didn't know what I would have to do. I remember thinking at one point, thank you Lord. You know you've had me training all these months for a marathon that I'm supposed to run in three weeks. I'm of the best physical shape of

my life. If this becomes physical, I think I have a chance that when you started to tap on that box, I remember thinking I had to take the bait, and for some reason that made me furious, and so I looked at him and I just said, slightly sarcastically, I said, what are you tapping on? And I remember he kind of cocked his head to one side and he was like a pencil box. And I thought, no, it's not I've never sent in an eighth grade with a pencil box.

But something again in me said, don't push Molly, and so we just kept talking and then at one point he looks at me and he says, Miss Hudgens, I've got something to tell you that I bet nobody's ever told you before. And I knew what he was going to say, but I said, well, honey, I don't know. I've been doing this job for a long time. My doubt there's anything you can tell me I haven't heard before. And he said, I bet nobody's ever told you they

had a loaded gun. And again, I said the first thing that came into my head, and I think the Lord gave me this. I said, well, no, honey, they haven't, but you probably wouldn't be the first person to have one here. And he unzipped his jacket the rest of the way and he pulled out the gun. He laid it right here on the desk in front of me, with the base of the gun facing away from me.

I remember reading the word millennium upside down and backwards and frantically trying to figure out I thought it was a nine millimeter. Later we would learn that it was a forty five. That only matters in terms of the number of bullets the gun can hold, and I knew that.

Then he unzipped his jacket and he reached into the outside pocket and he pulled out an additional magazine of ammunition, and he stood it up right beside the gun on my desk, and I start frantically trying to count the bullets that you can vaguely see through the side of the magazine. And then he pulls out a holster that we would later learn he had used to attach the

additional magazine to his ankle. And so he lays all these things on the desk in front of me, and it strikes me, you know, I'm like a three foot target. And so I remember standing up and leaning out, and I put my hands on like on the gun, and I said, honey, why don't we talk about what's going on, and or why don't you want me take these and then we can talk about what's going on? And he

yanked it all away. He shoved the magazine and the holster back into his outer pocket where they had been to begin with, and he held a gun in his left hand, pointed down with the floor. And so I am already like sort of halfway standing here because I've leaned over to touch the gun. So I just stood up the rest of the way and I put my hands up, and all I start being flooded in my mind with all these things I've learned. Is this a

hostage or a non hostage situation? You know, if it's a hostage situation, the goal is to lower their expectations until eventually the hostage taker realizes their best they're not probably going to get what they want, and their best option is to leave that situation. If it's a non hostage situation, the person already has what they want and you're not trying to lower expectations. You're trying to lower

their emotions. So I remember thinking to myself, You've got a lower his emotion, Stay calm, let him feel as if he has power. So I walk around the chair that sits at the end of my desk, and I got down on my knees and I think I heard that, get on your knees, and I realize now, you know, I was trying to put myself in a subservient position because now I am physically lower than him, even in height. And I remember hearing he's right handed. I knew he had taken the gun out with his right hand, but

he now had it in his left. So I put my left hand on his right shoulder, just like a like to comfort him. And then I just reached over with my right hand and I interlaced the fingers of my right hand with his right hand, and I remember thinking, well, if you're gonna shoot me, you're gonna have to do it with your non a dominant hand. And I just started talking. I couldn't believe this was happening. You know you asked earlier about that. Did you ever think something

like this will happen? No? But at the same time, I remember thinking a couple times, you're prepared for this than anybody else in this building. I work with some amazing educators who are very intellectual people, but I knew that none of them had researched this study this, so in my mind, I thought this was the perfect place

if he was going to come here. I tried to start fully engaging him in conversation, and not too far into that conversation, the worst case scenario happens when I start to hear noises in the hallway and I realized the kids are changing classes. I can hear the toilets start to flush in the girl's restaurant right here behind me. You can hear out in the hallway the locker doors are slamming. The kids are talking there, yelling to each other.

And then I thought, get ready, because here come the teachers. I could see them out of my peripheral vision, passing the glass pane in my door. At one point Glenn would come and stand there and look in, and I wouldn't make eye contact with him because I was afraid if I did, he would realize something was not right and he would come in. He stood there for probably I don't know, twenty seconds maybe, and then he left, and later I asked him, I said, listen, I'm so

glad you didn't come in. You weren't supposed to, But what kept you from that? And he said, well, Molly, I looked in there, and you were down on your knees, and I thought, well, lord, she's praying with him. She's gonna be in trouble. But whatever. He came back to his office.

he what he had done was already a felony. You know, bringing a loaded firearm or any firearm on a school campus is obviously against the law. He knew that he he had all these concerns about things, but it dawned on me that this was an even more critical situation than I first realized. When he explained to me that if he did not kill people here at school, that someone was going to kill his family. And in that moment, I, you know, I remember like almost inhaling sharply and thinking,

this is a psychosis. What you know, what you were, what you were seeing on Friday that was concerning to you, probably delusions, what you're seeing right now, hallucinations, like all of that began to piece itself together. And that's when I remember saying the prayer, Lord, help me, don't get help me, do not get lost in this. And so I started thinking, Okay, Molly, what would you actually do if you really thought that there was, truly there was a kid on campus whose family was in danger? What

would you do? And I thought you'd reach out to law enforcement. And so I remember telling him, you know, we've got to get someone to your home to protect your family. And I remember this look on his face that was like, she believes me. She believes me. So I decided to work from that approach. I would love to say that I had this beautiful strategy. In hindsight, I think it was a beautiful strategy, but it was

not of my creation. I know that for sure. It was like I played the best mental chess match of my life and I don't even know how to play chess, but I was working through everything that he would present. We talked for a long time. It starts to dawn on me that I cannot believe somebody has not come into this office. Our teachers were fairly accustomed to understanding that if the door to this office is closed, they

know not to come in. I'm either a meeting with the student, I'm on the phone, or there's something going on that I need a private setting. But I still was worried. Kids were so us to turn in your bed of fees that day. It was the last day, and I kept thinking, somebody's going to come in. And so I looked at him and I said, honey, listen, I don't know what it is, but I know that

God's got a plan for your life. And He's stiffened in his seat, and he looked down at me, and I remember he said, Miss Hudgens, do you believe in God? And I thought, oh, Molly, why did you say that. It's like my heart just dropped into my stomach. And then I just thought, well, if this is it, you know, I thought about Peter, and I thought that this is it. I'm not going to die denying the Lord. And I was terrified, and I said again, first thing that came to me. I said, well, honey, I do I do

believe in God, but I feel like you don't. You know, is there a reason that you don't? And he said, miss Hugeons, do you know how many times I've asked for help and nobody's ever helped me? And I said, well, what do you think this is? I said, you know, maybe God wasn't telling you no. Maybe he was just telling you to wait for today. And I said, listen, I don't I don't know what we're going to do, but I promise you two things. One I will not leave you, and two what we're going to figure it out?

And he started asking me all these questions about God, and I remember thinking how unusual that was, because of separation in church of church and state that my faith is not something I can go about and prophesy hear at work, you know, but if kids ask you questions about anything in a private study, you can certainly tell them what you believe or what you feel. And so I did my best to answer all of his questions, feeling inept because I didn't know the answers to some

of them. But I remember in that moment just having this thought, pray with him, what else do I have? It was like the first time in my whole life that I really really had to put my faith where my fear was. And so I just looked at him and I said, listen, I've got an idea. And I don't know what you think about this, but how would you feel if maybe we prayed about it? You know, you've asked me a lot of questions about God. You know, maybe we could just pray about it and ask for

some direction as to what we should do. And I really thought that he would say, you know, I don't I don't really want to do that, or I'm not comfortable doing that. But he didn't. He said, I think that would be okay. And there on my knees holding the hand of this child.

I remember feeling like this pressure at my back. I thought it was just because I had been in this position on my knees for so long, But at that moment, I just remember praying, Lord, if there is anything, that there is any negative entity affecting this situation, remove it from the equation. I felt like I was in a battle, a spiritual battle, something I had never experienced before, and I was scared. But I was going to fight, not just for the kids, not just for the staff, not

even just for me, but for him. See what I knew this whole time is that most people who commit mass murder before they are homicidal, they are suicidal. Their intention in most cases is to not survive their incident. Many of them are hoping their lives will be taken by law enforcement and they won't have to do it themselves. But I did not want to lose him either, and so at one point in the prayer, he raises the gun up, and I am thinking that he's gonna shoot himself.

And I remember being terrified and just thinking, what are you going to do, and then thinking are you just You're just gonna sit here, Molly, You're just gonna watch this happen, you know? Can you live with that? And I knew I couldn't, And so I let go of his shoulder and I reached out with my left hand and I still, I don't still know what I was gonna do. I guess I maybe was just going to

try to push the gun down. I don't know. But he raised the gun all the way up over his head and with his pointer fingers on the trigger, he scratched the top of his head with his middle finger, and I remember thinking that is not funny, but like, at the same time, it was. It was like in the middle of this, you know, I teach English, right, the climax, the point of greatest emotion in height whatever, It's like, God gave me this drop of humor just to remind me, like you were still in this, you

are not alone. This is a good fight, and you're in it. And so he raised, you know, lowered the gun, and I remember when I finished the prayer. He seen calmer. I had asked him several times through the course of this about giving me the gun, and every time he would say, Missagens, I want to give it to you, but I just can't. And so the prayer ended, and it was like this moment of just kind of what's next. You know, we are sweating profusely. It's still sitting here.

If I really think about it, I can smell it, like I'm just adrenaline and all that that's released in a moment like this. And I had been praying, like, Lord, I need some kind of opening. And I remember that he looked and I had a medal hanging up on the wall right up here that was from a five K and he just said, I forgot that you like to run. And we started talking about running, and I just thought, here's your opening. And I said, I said, yea, honey.

I said, you know, I told you guys yesterday and classroom guidance, I'm training for that marathon and I had to run ten miles this morning. I said that, you know, really rigs havoc on the knees. And he wanted me to go back and sit at my desk he thought I would be more comfortable, and I just said, I can't do that. I can't leave where I am. I'm going to stay right here, no matter how much my knees hurt until you until you give me that gun. And he said, well, I think maybe I want to

give it to you. And then I had this thought, if he gives that weapon to me, then he's going to feel like he's giving up his family. And so I looked at him and I said, well, listen, why don't you let me take it and then you don't

have to give it to me. And he said, okay, I think that'd be okay, and he leaned over and put the safety on, and I remember winging over him and taking the gun, and I just put my arms around there and we just hugged each other, me on my knees and him in his chair, and I'm patting him with one hand, and I remember telling him how much I loved him, how proud of him I was. I remember saying, you know, the right thing is never easy,

but it's still the right thing. And the whole time I am holding what I now know is a fully loaded gun, just because of the heaviness of it, and we stayed like that for a long time. I remember watching the clock. I still have it on the wall back there. An elementary teacher told me one time, if the kid ever hugs you, don't let go until they do. And I'll tell you I do that with everybody. If somebody hugs me, I never let go until they do. They must need it, and so we stayed that way

for a long time. I remember during that just thinking, just hold him like he's yours, Molly, just hold him like he's yours. I had two boys, so I understood that.

And finally when he let go, I stood up. I remember, like the blood my legs like ate horribly, like I guess all the circulation, the blood running back through my legs, and I remember thinking, though, you've never seen or read about a school shooter who only has one weapon, and so it was my assumption that there were more, and so I said to him, why don't you give me

all of it? And I was hoping if there were other weapons he would give me those as well, but he gave me I already had the gun, and so he gave me the magazine and the holster. I walked back around my desk right here and in the corner. I had two filing cabinets, and I wore the key to one of them around my neck on my lanyard. I still do, actually don't have the filing cabinet, but

I still have the key. And I remember going up and unlocking the drawer and like pulling it out and making a dent in my purse and thinking, I can't believe I'm making a dent in my purse to put a gun, but then putting in there and closing the drawer and locking it, and like the key falling back around my neck and literally thinking that's one way. And so I walked back around and sat beside him because there was another chair adjacent to his, and we just

started talking. We probably talked for fifteen more minutes. He wanted to know what I was going to do. He wanted to know what was going to happen to him. I couldn't answer any of those questions, so I stayed on the path that I had taken earlier with we have to protect his family. And I said to him, I said, honey, listen, I have got this friend who works in law enforcements, and I think he can help us. His name is Chris, And I said, wouldn't be okay

with you if I called him? And he said, yes, ma'am, I think that would be okay. And so what he didn't know was that Chris was the first name of our student resource officer. At the time, we had one SRO that covered four schools in our county, so we only had three county wide. I knew there was only a twenty five percent chance that Chris would be here, but I called him, and I'll never forget when he answered the phone because I was so relieved, and I said,

you know, hey, it's Mollie. Is there any chance that you're at the middle school today? And he said, well, I actually i am, but I'm in the conference room. I'm meeting with some parents. Can I call you back in a few minutes. And I said, well, this is kind of urgent, but because the whole time, the child is sitting across from me looking at me, and I am terrified he is going to jump up and bolt out the door. And so I said, yes, that'll be okay, but if you'll just come down as quickly as you can.

And so as soon as we hung up the phone, I realized that nothing in my voice. Nothing about the words I'd chosen would have been any indicator to Chris on the other end of the line that this was an emergency, although I was hoping he would read into something. And so I looked at the child and I said, Honey, would it be okay with you if I sent a text message to my husband to let him know that Bradley has baseball practice after school today. That was our

oldest child. And he said, well yeah, And so I sent a text message to Chris and it said I've just taken a loaded gun off of a child in my office. He doesn't know that I've contacted you. It's locked in a drawer, Please come down quickly. And I remember watching the screen fade to black and just hoping it went through. You know, old building still roof allows for terrible cell signal, And so I remember I even got on our student management system and said, honey, do

you have any missing assignments? And he looked at me like I've lost my mind? And I did. I printed him off, went through everything the kid was missing in language arts, math siens and social studies, just trying to buy some time. And at the end of that he said missagings. I think, I'm I think I'm just going to go back to class, and I said, no, let me, let me try one more time. So this time I

made the decision to call our assistant principle. I knew that I could have a conversation on my end that would make absolutely no sense on her end, and that she would get somebody she would know. So thing was not right. And so when I called her office, Chris, the SRO answered her phone and I said, hey, it's Mollie. I said, you know, I know you're working on something earlier.

Can you come on down now? And he said, well, we've actually had to move into vice the vice principal's office in order to review some bus footage from the incident. And I can tell he's a little frustrated, because you know, he is hard at work here trying to investigate a situation. And I continue to interrupt, So I said, well, listen, can you check your messages because I sent you an email or a text or something. Can you see if you got that. I'm having trouble getting those out today.

And he he looks at his phone and he says, Molly, I don't I don't have anything from you, and then he said, well, actually I just got a text message, and he read the first line of it and he said, I want you to stay on the phone as if we're still having a conversation. And I'm on my way, and I remember seeing him up here, at his face coming through that glass pane, and just thinking, you're not alone, which I hadn't been alone, you know, but now it

was like I had a person with me. And Chris came in and conducted the most gracious and kind interview. The child told him the same story he told me, and then he looked at Chris and he said, I went to Miss Hudgins because I thought she was the only person that could talk me out of this. And I remember thinking, if I live to be one hundred years old, I will never get a compliment any greater than that one. So I was allowed to stay with

him the whole time. I wanted to leave school with him, but Chris said to me, Molly, your job is done, and so I stayed. I wrote a statement for the police Central Office came they wanted me to go home. They felt like I should be able to take the day off or take a couple of days and I remember saying, well, who's going to do bus duty if I'm not here? Like, just stay in the course, right, And I did. I stayed all day, I did bus study,

I went to baseball practice. It was Wednesday night, and I went to church and came back the next morning, got up in around eight miles, slept like a baby, got to hear the next morning, and remember thinking, I'm so glad the flag is not at high staff. And it wasn't until I got to my door and I was kind of shaky, like trying to put the key in that I remember saying, Oh, good grief, Molly, it's in office going in. It would take me a while to realize that most people who experience a traumatic event

don't normally return to the city of the crime. And you know, work for seven or eight hours, and then I wouldn't see him again for a month.

a chair, just so they could all see me. And I remember saying, nobody knows what happened in my office this week except for me and this other student, and so I want to answer any questions you all have because I want you to know the truth. They asked questions for almost an hour. I would not tell them who he was. I knew that over the course of time they would probably figure out who he was based on just who did not return to school from an

extended absence. But I remember saying to him, do you guys remember the guidance lesson that we talked about on Tuesday before this happened, And it was a lesson on September eleventh. Our kids were not alive on September eleventh. So there's a lesson called one Life Can Make a Difference and it's about Wells Crowther, who lost his life in the World Trade Center rescuing people. And so it was a lesson on how anybody can do something to help someone else. You just have to be willing and

available and recognize that need. And so I talked to them about that, and I reminded them that one of the takeaways they were supposed to get is that sometimes there may be somebody who's struggling and they may not know how to ask for help, or they may be afraid or an embarrassed or ashamed to do that. And I remember saying, that's where you have to stand in the gap for them. You come and tell me, and we'll figure out what to do. And then I remember

telling them sometimes that person may be you. You may be the person who's struggling and you may think nobody can help you. But if you come to me, we'll figure out something. So I told him all said, you know, he did on Wednesday exactly what I told you guys to do. He was struggling, he was going through something, he did not know what to do, and he came to me for help. And I said, so here's what we're going to do. We are going to protect him.

And I remember telling them they could talk to anybody at school, at you know, the family, me, anybody on our staff about what had happened. But I remember saying we're not going to talk about this outside of our school family, and you want to talk about miracles. Those two under eighth graders never told his name, so it was never published. The media never descended on his home, his family never had to move. But I only got to see him one more time. I got subpoenaed, and

I had prayed that I wouldn't. I did not want any consequence he received to be connected to me. And I got there for court and the judge saw me and he said, I need to talk to you in my chambers. And we went in and he said, Missugens, I just went to a training in Memphis a month ago and you presented. And I said, yes, Sir, I did. And he said on school shooters. I said I know. And he said I can't believe this, and I said I can't either, and he said, well, we're going to

do something different. You're not going to testify. He said, I'm going to bring in the prosecutor and the defense attorney and I just very simply want you to tell them what happened in your office that day. And I guess I needed to tell it because I re enacted it. I got down on my knees and held hands with the prosecutor. And at the end of it, I remember

everything had changed, you know. She had come in like a ready to prosecute, and he had come in ready to defend, and all of a sudden it was different. And I remember one of them said to me, what do you think we should do? I said, I think we should get help for him. He came to me and he asked for help, and I promised him I would see this through to the end. And I remember saying, whatever we do is going to set a precedent, and I would really love for our little town in the

middle of nowhere to get it right. And I knew that if he went to jail, the course of his life would be changed forever. And I wanted more than anything for him to have a second chance. And I believe if we could protect his identity, he could have that. And they listened, and they made the decision that he

would go to an impatient mental health facility. I remember asking the one ask I had that day is if it was okay with him, if I could see him or speak to him again, And he still had on the same clothes he'd had on that day obviously when he left here, he had worn other clothing at the facility where he was kept, so it was a very real same shirt, same pants, and he was handcuffed, and he was shackled around his waist and he had shackles around his ankles. So I remember like whispering to one

of the deputies. Is all of that necessary? And he looked at me and he said, Molly, do you know what he did? And I said, I guess I'll always be a little too close to it. So he was seated on a bench. Our courthouse is very old, and it even has some benches that that probably came from a church. They looked like a church pew. And I remember he was seated and because of his hands, he

couldn't stand up on this without help. And so before I even thought about it, I just got down on my knees right in front of him, and I remember holding his hands. And he never spoke. I don't, I honestly don't think he could. But I looked at him and I told him all the things I said in my office, that I loved him, that I was proud of him, and I reminded him that I was going to be there until the end. I would see this through the end. And I remember saying, I said, listen,

I don't know what that's going to look like. I don't know how much I will be able to be involved, but I promise you I will be here. And I got up and I left, and I've never seen him again. On the fourth anniversary, a lady calls me from our community. She had worked at our school, so she knew who the child was, but she and her family owned a small business and she had no idea this was the

fourth anniversary of this incident. And she said to me, Miss Huggens, She said, the young man who was involved in the incident at school has applied for a job at our business. And she said, we really try to hire people who struggle. Maybe they don't have family, or they just don't feel like they fit in. And she said, I really feel like this would be a good place for him, but we want to hire him if you don't want me to. And I cried, and I said,

do you know what today is? Is the fourth anniversary? And I said, and you're calling to ask me to give him a job. Reference yes, hire him, Please hire him, and she did. She did. I thought many times about going to the business, you know, just like showing up. I wanted to see him so much. I just wanted to know that he was okay. I just wanted him to know somebody still cared about him. But something in

me just said, don't push Molly. And so when our book came out about our story, he found out from someone about the book, and a person came to me and said he would really like a copy that I think I can get that to him, and I said, well,

I will give him one. And so I remember I wrote in the cover everything I ever wanted to say to him, and I remember I wrote in there, listen, I don't know if you ever want to talk about this again, so I'm not going to try to find you, I promise, but I also want you to know that if you ever want to talk about this for the rest of your life, I will be here and you

know where to find me. And I really thought, I think I really hoped that he would read that book because the last chapter is all for him, and I thought you would read it and then like send me an email or reach out or something. But I had to realize that the way I experienced his incident was not the same way that he did, and I don't know how he feels about it, and that's okay. I wanted him to have a second chance, whatever that might look like, and he got that, and there's a great

joy for me. And knowing that this September will have been eight years and even though he has lived so closely to me, I've never seen him again. And I figure that one day, if it's God's will and in his timing, that I'll run into him somewhere. It'll probably be, you know, pumping gas or at a grocery store, and I hope that when I do that, he'll know how happy I am to see him, how grateful I am that he's okay. I want to hug him. There's so many things I want to say to him, and I

want to hear. Still, I still want to listen to what he experienced and what he went through as he as he healed. But if that is not meant to be. If that is not the case, then I have accepted that I did my part. I played the role I was supposed to in his life, and tent with that.

them particularly for their incident. I don't think anybody else in history could have performed the acts of heroisdom and bravery that they did on the day that they did, in the way that they did. Many of them are great men of faith, and their stories are what led me to start to feel as if I could share

my story. And with the Citizen's Honors, we have a multitude of recipients who are posthumous recipients who lost their lives in schools and I wear a bracelet every single day that has all their names on it, just to remind me that they were not gifted a ninety minute intervention. You know, they went directly towards an attacker in their schools and they lost their lives doing it. And so when I share story, I feel as if I represent them.

I know that I don't will never feel like I fit in a category with any of the citizen or the military recipients. But I know that as long as I'm alive, I can tell their stories and I can

remind people of their heroism. And when you look at the Malavana recipients and you look at the faith that they shared, I can't help but think about Gary Biker, who went back to school after Vietnam after he received the medal and got a master's degree in counseling and became a school counselor in Greece, New York for thirty four years. You know, they prepared me for how to go forward in this life, knowing that while some people would perceive what I did as heroism, other people would

think I just got lucky. I always say I didn't get lucky, I got rescued. And there's a big difference.

every day to people across the country. Yeah, and of course if I tilt the computer just slightly, you all can see there's You know, I've been given more accolades and things than I could ever you know, have in a lifetime, but they're nothing compared to just the opportunity to still be here, you know, and get to tell the story and share it with people. And so thank you for this opportunity. Not at all I appreciate it.

Honor recipients, follow us on Instagram and Twitter. We'll be sharing photos and videos of the heroes featured on the show. We'd also love to hear from you dm us with a story about a courageous veteran in your life. If you don't know a veteran, we would love to hear a story of how courage was contagious in your own life. You can find us at Pushkin Bonds. I'm your host, Malcolm Glampa.