{"id":33989,"date":"2023-05-17T00:10:06","date_gmt":"2023-05-17T06:10:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/police-civilian-heroes-commended-at-farmington-shooting-news-conference\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:15:32","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:15:32","slug":"police-civilian-heroes-commended-at-farmington-shooting-news-conference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/police-civilian-heroes-commended-at-farmington-shooting-news-conference\/","title":{"rendered":"Police, civilian \u2018heroes\u2019 commended at Farmington shooting news conference"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"A
A bullet hole is seen through the bedroom window of Jolene Robledo's home Tuesday, May 16, 2023, in Farmington, N.M. It was among the damage resulting from a deadly shooting along a residential street in the northwestern New Mexico community. (AP Photo\/Susan Montoya Bryan)<\/span>Susan Montoya Bryan<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A Farmington High School student with purported mental health issues and no adult criminal record left people who knew him shaken, when on the eve of his high school graduation he went on a shooting rampage through his neighborhood.<\/p>\n

Beau Wilson, 18, of Farmington, fired more than 150 rounds from two firearms and an assault-style rifle, killing three elderly women and injuring seven others, including two law enforcement officers, before he was shot and killed by police.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s taken me by surprise,\u201d said Lucas Posegate, 19, of Portales. He knew Wilson in high school and gave him rides to class.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe had auto shop and welding with me,\u201d Posegate said. \u201cHe was a good kid. I never really assumed he would have done something like this. He never gave off red flags to me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wilson was also a member of the Farmington High School wrestling team during his freshmen, sophomore and junior years.<\/p>\n

\"A
A Tuesday, May 16, news conference provided information on the Dustin-area mass shooting in Farmington that occurred May 16. (David Edward Albright\/Tri-City Record)<\/span>Susan Montoya Bryan<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Farmington Police still do not know what motivated Wilson to shoot up the neighborhood.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no way for us to tell his intent,\u201d Farmington Deputy Police Chief Kyle Dowdy said. \u201cMental health is something that came from interviews with family members.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dowdy added that Wilson did have minor infractions as a juvenile.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have not come across anything that would rise to the area of him being on our radar,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have come across that he potentially had some mental health issues and that has come across from interviews with involved parties in his life. There has been some concern about his mental health.\u201d<\/p>\n

The incident began at 10:56 a.m. Monday, when Wilson was caught on a Ring doorbell video firing the first shots. One minute later, Farmington Police were dispatched to the area of North Dustin and Ute Street in response to shots fired.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re having a difficult time getting the exact number of people who called, but it was hundreds of people,\u201d Dowdy said, adding that officers arrived on scene at 11:02 a.m. with shots still being fired.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe suspect roamed through the neighborhood and fired indiscriminately at six houses and three vehicles,\u201d Dowdy said.<\/p>\n

During this time, three women were struck with bullets. Melody Ivie, 73, and Gwendolyn Schofield, 97, died at the scene, while Shirley Voita, 79, was shot and taken to San Juan Regional Medical Center, where she died.<\/p>\n

\"Painted
Painted circles mark locations where evidence related to a deadly shooting was collected in front of a church in Farmington, New Mexico on Tuesday, May 16, 2023. Authorities killed the 18-year-old gunman Monday and the investigation is ongoing. (AP Photo\/Susan Montoya Bryan)<\/span>Susan Montoya Bryan<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cThe brutality that these people faced is something that is unconscionable to me, and I don\u2019t care what age you are or what else you have going on in your life to kill three elderly women in no position to defend themselves is always going to be a tragedy,\u201d Dowdy said. \u201cIt\u2019s three people who lost their lives that were absolutely innocent.\u201d<\/p>\n

Seven additional people were treated and released for injuries they received in the shooting, and several others were treated at the scene. Police did not have an accurate count of those treated for minor injuries.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are still gathering that information. We had so much coming and going from that,\u201d Farmington Police Deputy Chief Baric Crumb said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know that he was firing into vehicles, and with such action, when a round penetrates the glass of a vehicle that glass can explode into and upon the individuals,\u201d Crumb said. \u201cThat glass can cut and fracture and do damage to the individual persons. We know a lot of those were that type of injury.\u201d<\/p>\n

Officers contacted Wilson at 11:06 a.m.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey show up. They give commands \u2013 multiple commands. He starts firing at them. They fire back,\u201d Dowdy said, adding four officers fired a total of 16 rounds. \u201cSimultaneously, the officer and the suspect were shot.\u201d<\/p>\n

Police Sgt. Rachel Discenza was hit with a bullet in her pelvic region. She was treated and released at San Juan Regional Medical Center and is recovering from the injury.<\/p>\n

New Mexico State Police Officer Andreas Stamatiadas was driving by the scene and also was shot in his vehicle. He drove himself to the hospital, where he was treated for the injury.<\/p>\n

Multiple law enforcement agencies responded, offering assistance to Farmington Police. Dowdy added three Farmington officers were on their way to lunch when they heard the call. The officers abandoned their lunch, and not even outfitted in body armor, arrived at the scene to offer their help.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no doubt countless lives were saved by the heroic and quick action of law enforcement. There were many acts of bravery, I\u2019m sure we\u2019ll hear about,\u201d Farmington Mayor Nate Duckett said. \u201cI want to thank the neighborhood where this happened, and the number of citizens who came out to assist law enforcement.\u201d<\/p>\n

While there were both police and civilian heroes, all will need to heal, and according to Crum this will be a \u201clong and arduous\u201d process, in which the police will be committed to stand by the community\u2019s \u201cside every step of the way.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are victims\u2019 assistance services being offered to those affected by this, as well as in-house counseling for law enforcement involved.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur community is strong resilient and united together we will heal and overcome this tragedy,\u201d Crum said. \u201cWe stand as one.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

received hundreds of calls reporting the shooting<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":33990,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[168,799,2833,28,3786,445,51],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-33989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-crime","tag-farmington","tag-farmington-police-department","tag-headlines","tag-new-mexico-state-police","tag-newsletter-lead","tag-police"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33989"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33989\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":82433,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33989\/revisions\/82433"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33989"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=33989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}