The trauma surgeon has a daughter and says he is teaching her how to respect police. Williams says he does simple things around her, such as picking up tabs and buying ice cream for police officers.
“I want my daughter to see me interacting with police that way so she doesn’t grow up with the same burden that I carry when it comes with interacting with law enforcement, and I also want the police to see me, a black man, and understand that I support you, I will defend you, I will care for you. That doesn’t mean that I do not fear you,” he said.
Captain Dan Birbeck of the Dallas County Hospital District Police says the Dallas attack was the worst thing he has ever seen in his 20-year law enforcement career.
“I think we all know that when we do this job there’s a chance we may not come home,” said Birbeck. “It became real that night for our guys.”
“It’s shaken us, it’s shaken me to the core,” said Birbeck, who works in the hospital’s ER.
Authorities identified the shooter as 25-year-old Micah Johnson, a U.S. army veteran.
Dallas Police Department Chief David Brown says authorities are downloading over 170 hours of bodycam footage, as well as collecting dashcam videos, and footage from surrounding businesses. The videos will hopefully give officials a timestamp of the entire incident, Brown said. Detectives are reviewing over 300 statements on the attack, and some officers have yet to give their declarations. Dallas police and the FBI are working to find out what “RB” means, which was written in blood by the suspect on the wall in two different locations in El Centro College.
Five police officers were killed, nine were injured by either gunfire or fragmentation of bullets. Four of the injured were from the Dallas Police Department, three were DART officers, and two were officers from the El Centro College.
The funeral notices of the slain officers have been released.
