Matthew Kolakowski shopped for fishing gear and snacks with his daughter on a Michigan Walmart over the weekend when he heard an employee shouting “He has a knife” followed by sounds of screams.
Then he saw a man hurry against the box count.
“Suddenly I see him showing up, and I swear that we were locking our eyes for a moment and I cried on my daughter, ‘Stay here.’ So I just started running, ”Kolakowski said, remembering the moment he decided to confront the man who was accused of stabbing 11 people in the Traversse City store on Saturday.
Bradford Gille was indicted on Monday for terrorism and 11 counts of murder attempts. Police said they had no apparent motive for the violent attack carried out with a 3 1/2 inch (almost 9 centimeters) knife.
The actions of Kolakowski and some other men pulled smooth praise from Grand Traversse County Sheriff Michael Shea. Over the night, the alien online celebrities for their heroics became a video showing the confrontation spread rapidly on social media.
Kolakowski said that when he followed the man out of the store, he saw him throwing his leaf into an older woman outside. When he did not have weapons himself, Kolakowski grabbed a shopping cart, hoping to knock the man down when he gave Chase.
“He ran right behind her and buried his knife in the back, right in front of me,” Kolakowski said. “He pulled the knife out of her and went to leave, stopped and hesitated and turned as if he were going after her again. That was when he noticed me with the grocery truck … I just went as hard as I could and just got him on his ankles with the grocery car from behind.”
Kolakowski, a 39-year-old disabled veteran, quickly became with another man with a shopping cart who stopped the man who was later identified by the authorities as Gille. A third man pointed a gun at the man and repeatedly required him to drop the knife.
Eventually, he put the knife down and Kolakowski said he jumped on the man and held him until police quickly arrived.
“Honestly, I didn’t hesitate at all,” Kolakowski said, talking from his home in nearby Kent City. Although he was on duty to be stabbed himself, he said, “I was just continuing.”
Shea said the 11 victims were men and women aged from 29 to 84, including a Walmart employee. Everyone was expected to survive, officials said.
Authorities said Gille, 42, has a history of mental health problems and has been arrested or ticketed several times in Petoskey, Michigan, the area since 2001. He has also received prison sentences for assault and violent violations.
In 2017, he was found not guilty because of insanity after being indicted for damaging a tomb and tilted over burial markers at a Ptoskey cemetery. And Petoskey police reported talking twice with Gille in recent days about loating.
In a statement on Monday, the Petoskey Department of Public Safety said the agency was looking for and receiving a court decision on Friday to place Gille in protection and consider him a risk to himself or others.
But they couldn’t find him – until Traversse City knives took place.
Gille’s mother told Petoskey News review in 2007 that her son had been in a long-term cycle of mental illness. Beverly Gille praised at the time police and judges that she said tried to help him.
“He is doing well when he is on his medication,” she told the newspaper. “The problem is that his illness tells him that he is doing well and does not have to take his medication.”
By his arranging on Monday, Gille seemed agitated and seemed to suggest he was homeless. A plea was filed about non-Guilty for him and the bond was set at $ 100,000.
Kolakowski said that when he and the other shoppers surrounded the man at the Walmart parking lot, it was clear that something was not right. He described the man as the wild eye and sweated vigorously and described them in the store as “bad, as if he made an apology why he stabbed everyone.”
Kolakowski brother -in -law, Chris O’Brien, who recorded the video, said the “crazy” scene unfolded incredibly quickly and that Kolakowski’s actions certainly prevented more stabbing.
“It’s his courage that is the craziest part. It was something to witness,” he said.
“A guy stuck people and we were just next on his list if we didn’t do anything right,” said O’Brien. “Matt was determined to make sure it stopped then and there, and he was sure hell did it.”
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Associated Press -Journalists Ed White and Corey Williams contributed.