South Carolina Security Officer Killed in Mass Shooting
Greenville SC July 6 2020
Two people are dead including a security officer and eight others were injured after a predawn shooting Sunday at a nightclub on White Horse Road in Greenville County.
The shooting follows three others in the county over the holiday weekend, one at a neighboring nightclub where another security guard was shot.
A Greenville County Sheriff’s Office deputy driving in the area noticed a “disturbance” at the Lavish Lounge in the 1700 Block of White Horse Road just before 2 a.m. July 5, according to investigators. He called for emergency backup because of active gunfire inside the building, according to Lt. Jimmy Bolt.
County deputies, officers from the Greenville Police Department and troopers from the state Highway Patrol responded to the club and found multiple gunshot victims inside the lounge.
The injured people have a range of injuries, some minor and some critical. The injured were all treated at Prisma Health Upstate’s Greenville Memorial Hospital, investigators said.
Six of the injured had been released from the hospital as of 3:30 p.m. Sunday, hospital spokeswoman Sandy Dees said. Two people remain hospitalized and at least one of them is critically injured, according to the Sheriff’s Office.
The Greenville County Coroner’s Office identified the dead just before noon Sunday. They are 23-year-old Mykala Bell of Greenville and 51-year-old Clarence Sterling Johnson of Duncan. Duncan was a security guard at the club.
Greenville County Sheriff Hobart Lewis said at a Sunday press conference that the shootings are “probably gang-related.” The first shot was fired at 1:46 a.m. Sunday.
Investigators have said they are looking for at least two suspects, but no descriptions of the people have been made public. Several people were being questioned as of 1 p.m. Sunday.
Sheriff Lewis said the investigation indicates there were about 200 people inside the club at the time of the shooting — more than the maximum capacity allowed in the business during an emergency order in place due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Lewis said he would work with the State Law Enforcement Division and the state Department of Labor Licensing and Regulation on the possibility of getting the club’s license revoked.
Early Saturday, the day before the shooting at Lavish, there was a shooting at the Dolce nightclub next door. A security guard was wounded in that shooting, which remains under investigation.
In recent years, at least ten security officers have lost their lives in other mass shootings.
A lone gunman carrying a .45-caliber pistol killed 12 people, including two unarmed security officers at a country music bar in Thousand Oaks, California on November 8 2018.
Two unarmed security officers working an event at the Route 91 Harvest music festival on the Las Vegas Strip in Nevada were among the 59 people killed by a crazed gunman.
Aaron Feis, 37, a father and husband, was one of the 17 people killed in the Valentine’s Day massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida.
On June 12, 2016, Omar Mateen, a 29-year-old security guard, killed 49 people, including two unarmed security officers inside Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida.
A security officer died along with three others at a nightclub in Los Angeles three years ago.
On March 21, 2005, a 16-year-old shot and killed seven people at Red Lake Senior High School in Red Lake, Minnesota, and wounded five others. The dead included an unarmed security guard at the entrance of the school, then a teacher and five students. The gunman committed suicide.
