“I’m terrified and freezing,” is a text message Lubbock Avalanche-Journal Business Reporter Sarah Self-Walbrick sent from the scene of the murder of Texas Tech Police Officer Floyd East on October 9.
Self-Walbrick, who is a Texas Tech alumna and former Hub@TTU employee, only works the “night cop” shift on Monday nights. When she got a call that there was an active shooter and lockdown on campus, she rushed out of the door of the newsroom into a photographer’s car.
Before that, she was helping a woman who messaged the A-J on Facebook determine the name of a burger restaurant that closed in the 1960s.
“It all happened very, very quick,” she said.
Screen shot from Self-Walbrick’s Facebook Live video of Chris Cook.
They were on campus by 8:30 p.m., seven minutes after the initial TechAlert and phone call.
She had heard that there was a police officer shot and killed, but waited to hear official confirmation.
Chris Cook, communications director for TTU, addressed the reporters within 30 minutes, confirming that a police officer was shot and killed at the police station and the suspect was at large.
Self-Walbrick streamed this on Facebook Live. When Cook showed a picture of the suspect shortly after, she took a picture and tweeted it out along with the suspect’s name, Hollis Daniels.
“I thought it was so important to get his name and his picture out there, so we could hopefully get him caught,” she said.
Meanwhile, Emily Boneta was in class when a student addressed her professor and she was then told to move into the corner of the room.
“At first I thought she was kidding,” Boneta said. “Then everyone started checking their emails like ‘oh my gosh, this is what’s going on.’”
She said they all started letting their loved ones know they were okay. But because everyone seemed to be using their phones, it was not easy for her to load the news.
“My mom, one of my best friends, they would send me updated text messages about what’s going on,” Boneta said.
She was not able to stay up to date on every piece of information, but used news organization Facebook pages to share news stories.
“It was just really hard to try to keep up because of the uncertainty,” Boneta said.
It would have been more terrifying for her if the shooter was out to hurt a lot of people, she said, but she said she knew enough to understand that it was somewhat of an isolated incident.
Simon Parmley was also in her class, and said they felt good about being in a secure part of the College of Media and Communication’s basement.
“If we were up in a place with windows, and would’ve seen the cop cars zipping around, it would have been a very different experience,” he said.
They agreed that they were able to get accurate information, to an extent.
Meanwhile, rumors were spreading quickly.
At 8:42, the Twitter account @TTUProb tweeted “Texas Tech is currently on lock down. Two shooters at large. One death reported. Please seek shelter and spread the word.”
An attempt to interview the account administrator of @TTUProb was unsuccessful.
That tweet got more than 4,000 retweets and 4,000 likes. At 8:55, @FOXSanAngelo also tweeted “Allegedly two shooters at large.”
“We heard a lot of rumors that were either floating around on social media or other things that just weren’t confirmed,” Self-Walbrick said.
She said she wanted to provide as many details to her audience as possible, while also making sure that information was accurate.
Michael Cantu, opinions editor for The Daily Toreador, said he heard a lot of “Twitter chatter” that night, but he felt it was his job to make sure what The Daily Toreador was saying was true, and dispel any myths that were circulating.
The Will Rogers and Soapsuds statue was wrapped in black and blue to honor Officer East the day after his death. Maddy McCarty/The Hub@TTU
“The entire night, we had no idea what we were doing,” Cantu said. “We were just kind of following what we could verify.”
He said he was using Twitter to tell people information that they might not already know, like specifically what areas to avoid because of heavy police presence.
“We really did try to speak to the masses and not worry about the clicks,” Cantu said.
@TTUProb said in a tweet that there was “reports of an accomplice,” and their “main goal is to let those unaware know to seek shelter.” The account later replied to the original tweet, saying there had only been one shooter confirmed.
Chris Cook said he is “uncertain where that rumor generated,” but he does not know of any investigation into it at this time.
Twitter may be the newest way that inaccurate information spreads after a news event, but The Atlantic reported that the same has happened for decades, citing television inaccuracies during and after 9/11, radio reporting on JFK’s assassination, and newspapers reporting after the Titanic sunk.
The article says that is because of how breaking news works. The time after a huge news event is complicated and sources of information can be confusing.
Self-Walbrick said although she was near the crime scene, she felt safer being near the police station and knowing that the shooter would not return to the scene of the crime.
“We did know that there was a lockdown, and that there was an active shooter,” she said. “Frankly, in situations like that, it’s a journalist’s job to go out to the scene. We are not on lockdown.”
Cantu also said he had reason to worry for his own safety.
“So I go out driving… while it’s dark. I’m in my truck and I pull up next to the crime scene,” he said, “I really don’t have anything on me that says I’m with The Daily Toreador. So my thinking was, if I’m not careful, I could be mistaken for somebody else.”
A blue line marked the seal of Texas Tech University the day following the shooting. Maddy McCarty/The Hub@TTU
After he was blocked from entering the parking lot of the Texas Tech Police Department, he saw a tweet from Lubbock Police Department telling media to set up near the intersection of 19th Street and Boston Avenue.
He said he felt safe there because he could easily get under cover if needed, and there was a heavy presence of police.
Research shows that most journalists witness traumatic events in their line of work, and the rate of journalists that experience post-traumatic stress disorder ranges somewhere from four to 59 percent.
Self-Walbrick witnessed police officers working diligently, but she could tell that they were upset.
“It definitely was upsetting know such a horrible crime happened just feet away from where I was standing,” Self-Walbrick said.
Cantu said he was running on so much adrenaline at the time, it took a while to process all the emotions he was feeling.
“I don’t think I’ve ever felt sad, happy, scared, excited and 15 plus things at one time,” he said. “It’s Monday night at 9 p.m. and here I am up and filled with adrenaline.”
He said it was not until Thursday night, three days after the shooting, that he could sit down and realize what had actually happened.
“I was just out there trying to get a story out to people.”
About Maddy McCarty
