Witnesses, residents react to deadly shooting in Logan Circle in DC

I didn't really understand what was going on and then we saw right on our floor the commotion that was there. We didn't understand was it a machine that had, it was really loud obviously, and then there wasn't much happening and then we saw the commotion and then the stunts that were going on. You're not expecting to hear a gunshot. I thought it was actually a machine that exploded, maybe. Thank you. But then we quickly realized, because then I looked across the way and there was definitely fatality there. It seemed like the guy was not moving and definitely on the ground. And then the safety and security policies, obviously, procedures kicked in and we all had to leave immediately. Thank you very much. Yeah. There was no way of leaving the floor without moving past the guy, so it looked fatal to me. But then we exited the gym, and then I was explaining to the cop what happened with some other people, and that's when we heard the additional gunshots, and we literally ran for our lives. There was gun smoke everywhere, and I was then hearing multiple shots, and then we all ran into Call Your Mother. And that was Shelton Place, who did a very good job of letting us hide in their kitchen and bathroom. And the staff are really, really, very, very professional. And it's already been there. Yeah, and you're probably just kind of processing it now. Yeah, I think it's horrific for the families who are now having to deal with casualties, you know, loved ones. Totally. And I understand that there's more than one shooting, but I think that there was only one in the gym. I'm not sure how many. Because, yeah, we were hearing that at least four people shot, but to your knowledge, you only saw one person shot in the gym. But you were running out and you heard more gunshots? No, when I was outside. When you were outside, you heard more gunshots? Yeah. Did you see the shooter at all? No, but there were other people with me in Call Your Mother and there were definitely visibility of the guy. Okay. Did anyone say anything about what this person looked like or what kind of a gun it was? They were explaining it to the police. I didn't really see that, so I can't really verify anything. But it's... I don't even know if he's been caught or... No, still at large. Oh, OK. Well, at least at our last word that we were told. So, but you don't know any, whether it was, what kind of a gun it was? Was it a single shot? Was it rapid shots? I don't know. I mean, the sound to me was loud, but I don't know what kind of gun that would have been. I mean, I didn't hear it backfire, and we heard just two shots of the gun, so I don't know what kind of gun that was, to be honest. I don't know what's going on. Yeah, Jacqueline, Steve, I'm here with Cesar, who says he is a Call Your Mother employee. Tell me what happened. So we was at work, and at first, like, we just seen, like, the fire alarms go on, and, like, we thought it was, like, some regular fire alarm. Then we all went in. I'm sorry, we all went out. We was waiting. And then until we heard like the shootings happening and then we seen all the people started running away from it, like from the place. And since they didn't have nowhere to go, they went inside of a building. And when they went inside of the restaurant, there was this one girl that came over here and she told us that she seen a guy, she seen a guy with a shotgun, with a green shotgun. And apparently she thinks that like the guy live in the floor because she has seen him like a few times in the place. And, um, apparently the guy, um, he shot, like, the top of the elevator to activate the alarms. This is what she told you? Yeah. And, um, and when, when the guy seen the girl, he was like, oh, you better keep running. It's better for you to keep running than, than just stay over here. And she told us that the guy seemed very calm about the situation. Like, he seemed like he knew what he was doing. Did anyone else know of this person? Anyone else say anything of this person? No, no, no. They just told us that it was, like, an elderly guy. Like, I don't know. He seemed like he was kind of old, like for his age. How are you doing? How are your co-workers? I'm just like still scared about the situation. Like after seeing so many people running and all this police coming to the place, they even evacuated everybody else that was in the restaurant, including my team members. Yeah, they came, the police took us out in groups and they came with shields and stuff. And like, it was way too crazy. What was that like in that moment? It felt very, very, like I'd never seen anything like this, so I was in shock. I was just like, I didn't know how to react at the moment. But I was helping people and making sure that everybody was fine. Yeah. Did you also hear the gunfire? Yeah, we heard the gunfire. It was a lot of them. It was, like, maybe, like, six or seven of them. And they sound very close and very loud, like, really loud. So you knew instantly. Yeah, we knew instantly there was something going wrong when we heard the shotguns and, like, yeah. And you also told me you live near the area. Yeah, we live near the area. And, like, usually you don't get to see this type of stuff happen around the area. It's, like, really calm over here. So it is pretty weird. To see this kind of stuff. Do you think you're going to, you know, go home? You're going to stay around here? Well, I'm going to have to wait a little bit because I got my house keys in the area. So, like, yeah. You mean back at the job? At the job, yeah. So you can't even go home right now? I can't even go home. I have to wait a little bit. I'm sorry. I'm glad you're okay. I'm glad everybody else, right? Yeah. Everybody else was okay? Yeah, everybody else was fine. It's just like they were, like, what's it called? They were traumatized about the situation. Yeah, yeah. Like, there was so many people crying in the restaurant because, like, They haven't, I guess they haven't heard, like, a bunch of shots and stuff like that, and, like, it is pretty scary. When this happened, then, did you all, like, what happened inside the restaurant? Well, it happened around, like, 8:30, I would say, and, like, we was just over here, you know, the usual, making orders, like, making sure everything was fine, until, like... The fire alarms went on, and yeah, that's when everything went off. Were people ducking as well? Did you think that this was going to come toward you all? No, we never thought it was going to come to us. We thought it was just like a regular fire alarm. I don't know. That's why we just kept so calm until we heard their shots. What is everybody saying about this now? They were pretty scared. Everybody wanted to go home at the time. Everybody wanted to evacuate the situation. And, like... Nobody could because the police were telling us, stay inside, don't come out, don't even look out the windows because it was pretty scary. Seeing all the police running and you see shields, really big guns. It is pretty scary. Yeah, I do think we have another... Witness on the phone, Mary Ellen, who joins us now. And Mary Ellen, tell us where you were, what you experienced and heard or may have seen while you were there in that area of Logan Circle. Corner of Q and 15th, so just about really a block up from the Vita Fitness. And we walked out of the house about, I don't know, 8-ish. To take our dogs on a walk and we heard the fire alarm going off but we hear those from time to time so we didn't think much of it we just you know whatever like kind of went along our way towards our street we went the opposite direction with the dog and we were I don't know maybe just a couple minutes into the walk. And all of a sudden we heard this bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, like that. I mean, it was crazy. It was obvious it was gunshots. We looked at each other like, oh my God, that was gunshots. And then we see all of these other people who had been out walking their dogs come running by us from the Vita Fitness direction. And we asked them where, you know, where did it happen? They said in front of Vita. And so we all went running down 14th towards, again, towards our street in that direction. And my husband and I just ducked into the hardware store over there, Logan Hardware, and just stayed in there for a little while. To kind of just calm down a little bit and feel like we're taking some kind of cover. And then we heard all of the police and emergency vehicles going to the scene. And after a while we left the hardware store and walked back to our house again on the corner of 15th and Q. And that's where command is like set up right now, right in front of our house. So we are just looking out and seeing everything going on. It's a little crazy. Wow. So when you saw all of this happening, what was your emotion like when you were watching this all unfolded? I mean, obviously a very busy area. It's not uncommon for police to sometimes be going through downtown D.C., parts of D.C., but not something of this presence of this nature and such a massive response. So what was your initial emotion, your initial thought? Well, I mean, freaking out. We were freaking... Well, I can speak for myself. My husband's here too. I was freaking out because we don't normally have situations like this. We don't normally hear gunshots. So we were initially freaking out and then the presence, all of the police coming told us it was really something major was going on. We could smell the smoke from the gunshots. So it was shocking. I mean, we're very shocked, very worried to even walk back home from the hardware store. But we decided, get home, that's the safest place to be. And I think he's gonna say something. And if you don't mind, this is Brad, Mary Ellen's husband. From my immediate thought was, we didn't know what was going on, but in certain Incidents where a suspect flees, they sometimes tend to go somewhere. It sounds like he went into the Metro Polo condominiums above VIDA Fitness at Logan Circle. But they could flee, they could be in an alley, they could be in somebody's backyard, they could be anywhere and sometimes it's hard to, my primary objective is like get my family away and not, because the closer we get to a house, we might run into the suspect along the way. They could be hiding behind trash cans or in an alley, so. We opted to go further away. Mary Ellen, Brad, I had a quick question for you. I know you said your house or your home is right in front of where this police presence is. Do you all have a ring camera or anything that would be able to see what that police presence looks like from your area that you can access on your phone? Or even go back and to see if maybe the suspect may have crossed right in front of your home area? Yes, great question. We actually do. It's similar to a ring camera. The police has asked us to go through that later, but right now they're asking us to be in the house. We have two cameras, a previous robbery in 2023, I believe, at the TD Bank. We provided We've added that to authorities, and we were able to... Catch the suspect. We believe we're the suspects at that time, including audio, which was helpful for them to establish the suspects being tied together. Well, you know, we can help this time, too. As I was going to say, you never know if if something like that is able to help law enforcement again this time. Glad you guys are safe. Appreciate it. I want to bring in Tailgate Ted. He's a good friend of Fox 5. Tailgate Ted, let's bring him in on the line. I saw online that your wife is actually inside of a building that's been on lockdown now for over an hour. Have you been able to have contact with her? And if so, what is she saying and how are you feeling right now? I'm actually feeling a little bit better right now. She has been texting. And I'm trying to stay calm during the entire situation because all I want to do is get down there. But thankfully, you guys have been keeping us updated on what's going on and to stay away from the area. But she just sent me a text that the shelter in place has been lifted and normal operations may resume. And her building is not that far from everything that's going on. So I was shocked to receive this, but also thankfully relieved. Yeah, I can only imagine. Gosh, Ted. So what is she saying about all of this right now? It's just nerve wracking. She's not too far from the metro station where the National Guardsmen lost their lives. And it's something that you kind of fear working not too far from the White House. Every time I drop her off at the metro and you hear stories like this kind of pop up on the air, you get texts or tweets about what's going on. And you never think it's going to happen to one of your loved ones. But let alone today, it actually did. And I was going to go down there and drop off some breakfast for her. Because I was dropping off breakfast with This is some other friends this morning and. I couldn't get anywhere near it. Gosh, I can only imagine what that felt like. You've been here for quite some time. I mean, a scene like this, what we're seeing right now, a scene of an emergency response, so many partner agencies helping the Metropolitan Police Department to keep the area safe and secure. What do you make of the scene that you're seeing right now that looks like something, quite frankly, out of a movie? Hit the nail on the head. It feels like it's a movie scene, almost like Michael Bay was filming Transformers 7 down here with all the action that's happening. But I'm also relieved to know that the men and women of the D.C. police are doing what they need to do to really calm the situation down and bring it to an end. Absolutely. Thank you for a few moments of your time. Stay safe. Tell your wife we are thinking of her here at Fox 5 as well. And keep us posted if there's If there's any more developments within your family unit. I definitely will. And thank you all for keeping us updated with everything you guys are doing to cover this for us. You're so welcome. All right. We also have another witness who lives near the scene of the shooting. This is Scott Wolfson, who's joining us now. And again, if anybody at home is watching our coverage this morning, you were there. You have folks in the area and you want to give us a call and give us some description of what you saw. We're really asking the community because you are our eyes and our ears right now because we are still not getting a whole lot from police. But let's bring Bring in Scott Wolfson now joining us. And Scott, tell us a little bit about your experience. Thanks for joining us, first of all. But tell us a little bit about what you experienced this morning, what you may have heard, what you may have seen. Bring us up to speed on your accounts of what happened. Sure thing. Yeah, I was actually just walking back to my apartment from morning coffee, saw the helicopters overhead. And it was a little unusual for the area. As a former Fox 5 TV news photographer, I'm used to being on the other side of tape. And in this case, an officer kindly let me get back to my apartment. I Checked with Muse, honestly, to find out what was going on, as well as the next door neighbor who said that there was an active shooter. And there's a tremendous amount of law enforcement activity, as you've noted, as the cameras are showing. And it's one of those areas where things like this don't usually happen. So it's extremely unnerving. It's so upsetting and disheartening to know that people were harmed And the last I had heard. Is that at least one person may have lost their life. So this is one of the unfortunate realities of living in a city. And folks finding no other recourse than heinous and horrible acts of violence like this. Scott, as Scott mentioned, Scott is a former longtime colleague of ours here at Fox 5, covering many, many scenes similar to this over the years that Scott was with us here. But Scottie, I got to say that this response seems a lot for a situation that we clearly don't know all the details for. But I'm just curious for you as someone who is a veteran of being behind the camera for many years, you know, in D.C. and all around the country. What are your thoughts? Yeah, that's a good point, Steve. And quite honestly, as many times as I've been right up on the tape and trying to get a better angle to help folks figure out what's going on. For a shooting, it is an unusual level of response. It certainly sparks plenty of questions. And as you've noted, and I'm able to see on my phone screen some of what your cameras are capturing, I think honestly, Steve, this takes me back to 2002 when. When a lot of us were covering the DC sniper attacks, I don't know whether it's because of the location that this happened. I don't know whether it's because of the people involved. You know, there's a lot of There's plenty of natural questions that come to my mind. Was it the way that the person was armed? Was it the way that the person or people carried this out? And it's frankly, You know, unsettling and unnerving to not, well, it is comforting as a resident in this area to see the level of response, to feel like I'm safe, at least, you know, currently just standing outside of my apartment, but I'm not looking to get any closer to the action. Thank you for your question. It is surprising to see this level of response. And here I'm looking across the street at not only multiple different police agencies, but armed and uniformed National Guard troops. So I don't know what you all have heard that could enlighten me and the rest of our viewers anymore. But it. It really does take me back to the D.C. sniper attacks. Yeah, and I think for anybody who's been here a long time, that's a natural reaction. You know, Scott, just real quick, and then we'll cut you loose to go on with your daily activities as best as you can. But as a neighbor, as someone who lives in that neighborhood, it has to be an odd dynamic to find that balance between the comfort of knowing that the response will be there when needed, but also on the other side of things, the fact that it is needed. It is. And like I said, Steve, it's disheartening and unsettling. And this is not the kind of thing that's going to stop me from living my life the way that I do. It is an unfortunate reminder of truly how precious life is and how quickly things can change. And as you noted, it is comforting and gratifying to know that when things go sideways, when Bad things happen to presumably good people that there are so many who are willing to rush into harm's way and help the rest of us stay safe. Scott, appreciate it. Speaking of stay safe, keep the family safe as well, but I appreciate you joining us this hour. Live in the neighborhood. Thank you. I live right up here behind Logan Circle. I work right here at Player's Club. I was on my way to go get some lunch over here at Stoney's and walked up to this and then when I walked up here, I got a bunch of messages from my parents in Delaware saying that there was an active shooter in the neighborhood. Honestly, right now, I'm really impressed by the police presence and our National Guard right now. It's really impressive. Christian, that's how you found out about this, from your parents in Delaware? Yeah, yeah, in Delaware, yeah. So this reached a lot of people. What was your reaction when you learned the severity of what's going on? Oh, yeah, I didn't understand the severity until about a minute ago when I was hearing some of the other people talk. I didn't realize that the shooting was that massive right now. So that's... Yeah, that's shocking to me right now. You told me you were born here in D.C., you live in the neighborhood here, you use the businesses up and down the street. What's in your heart about what's going on? You said shocking. Yeah, because I know this neighborhood is a very close-knit neighborhood. A lot of people know. I'm wanting each other out here. So, yeah, I'm just worried about the neighborhood. I'm worried about the people that work up and down on this strip. So I'm just hoping everybody's okay and their business is going to open up today. And I had asked you, do you know if your people are okay? Yeah, I've sent out some messages, so I was going to go over to Stoney's. Thank you, guys. I haven't heard anything back yet, but I'm just hoping everybody's okay out here. You live in here. You said you didn't hear the shooting. I woke up with the helicopters over my window. I live on 16th and U, so quite a few blocks from here, but I woke up with helicopters over my window. And when I picked up my phone, a friend who lives nearby just had messaged me saying that he heard shots. Thank you very much. That's how I woke up. I had to walk down to a doctor's appointment, but now trying to go back home and I'm stuck here, can't cross. It's going to be a terrifying way to start your day. What was the first thing you did? It is. Well, I had to go to that doctor appointment, but I turned on the social media to see if there was anything happening. And I have people from all over messaging me like, are you okay? Is everything okay? So, yeah. It's a horrible way to wake up. Yeah, unfortunate to say the least. But you've lived in this neighborhood for nine years. Nine years, yeah. It's a busy, active place. What's life like here normally? Life is great in this neighborhood. It's a very lively neighborhood. There is a lot of business, restaurants, bars. Thank you. The occasional incidents happen, but the scale of this is extremely large, like I've never seen anything like it. It's quite a massive response. Have you ever been in a situation to see something like this? People here who have been in DC for a while are thinking back to incidents like the Navy Yard shooting we had over 10 years ago and other experiences like that. Yeah, I mean, I have not seen it. I mean, I was on... There was a shooting up here a couple years ago in front of a bar up here, but that was a targeted shooting. It was a very targeted thing. But nothing like this, barricades, people still in on active scenes. There's certainly emergency alert text messaging these days that we didn't have the availability to use a number of years ago. Did you feel like you got enough of an information stream as this was going on this morning? Oh, yeah. Like we got... Message prompted on our phones around here, like emergency alerts, alert to stay in shelter. Unfortunately, I was already here when that happened. But yeah, like we got a lot of, like the whole city is talking about all the way up until the downtown. Does this alter how you feel about your home now? No, I think it's part of living in America nowadays. Like it's not. Anything new, really, it's very unfortunate that it's like this. We need to get some more gun control in this country, but this is part of living here. It happens all the time and it happens in every town and it happens in schools all the time. It's a horrifyingly truthful statement, Casey. Thank you very much for your time. We appreciate it. We're glad you're safe and we're glad you and your neighbors are getting through this morning. They started describing this guy and then we start hearing five shots and people start running and we all start running. And so you ran out of Vida. Oh no, we like all evacuated. We were running out. The people who saw it, it happened. I think like a couple people saw it like happening in front of their eyes. They ran out, but we're still trying to figure out like what the situation is like. So we just, we're walking, we're evacuating, right? Yeah. And then while we're outside, like five minutes after like this happened, we're all outside and then we hear more gunshots and people just like scattered. So did you run? I ran. I ran like past like Whole Foods, like to like Bluestone. Cafe shop, how are you feeling? It's it must be horrible. It's horrible It's like surreal like even like I'm a part of like the situation or I knew it Like I was at like the first point of like the instant, you know, yeah, but yeah, yeah I'm sorry. I know some of us joined a little bit late here. Was there anything said like what happened to lead up to this? Or did you just hear? I did not hear no words, no nothing like that. I just heard a loud bang. That's it. So there wasn't like no argument or anything like that. But also thing would be that it's like you have to scan in to get inside. So either like someone let him in or he scanned and he's a member of this. But this is like also near. So once you Scan in. You have to go down an area because like this area is like kind of underground. So it's like near that area. And I don't know. I just heard a loud bang and he was around that vicinity. Did you talk to anyone who saw what happened? No, I didn't, I did not talk. I think the people who saw it just ran because they knew what was happening. Like everyone else, like 90%, 95% of people didn't know what was happening. They just heard a loud bang. Maybe they thought like a bouncy ball popped or like it was a gunshot, you know? Like the gunshot is like middle of my list, you know? It's not the bottom, it's the middle. Like I would think like somebody else, like a painting fell down or something. So you were inside the gym when this happened? I was on the treadmill when it happened. You saw someone, you guys thought he was dead already? Are you ready? Someone told me he was dead and I saw someone laying at first and someone said he's dead. I'm like, really? And then I take a peek and he's not moving at all. So then I took it for face value that he was dead. And then the people on the cardio floor or area, they have to kind of jump, not jump over him, but walk over him. And he was... He wasn't moving at all, so.