Private Security Officers Target of Violence During Reopening of Businesses
Charlotte NC 24 2020
Private security officers have once again become the target of violence since the reopening of businesses, malls, and nightclubs during the past few weeks.
To understand the dynamics of how private security officers are often the target of assaults, shootings, and death, you need not look any further than the past 7 days.
Three security officers have been murdered, six others have been shot and two other security officers have been stabbed in unrelated incidents. And there have been numerous others physically assaulted while enforcing the rules and just doing their job.
One of the most shocking and violent killings involved an 85-year-old security officer, George David Herrin of Richland Mississippi while he was working at the Canton Estates in Madison County, not far from Jackson.
Sheriff investigators now say that he was “executed” and shot multiple times while sitting inside his vehicle on June 16th.
Just 93 minutes later, Larry Franklin, a security officer for just 3 weeks was murdered at another apartment complex after asking two men to turn their car radio down at a fast food drive-thru.
Less than a day later, a retired Lake County, Indiana Sheriff’s officer was killed when a colleague opened fire during a fight with a combative psychiatric patient at a Munster Indiana hospital.
As the men were struggling and out of fear that he was trying to get the armed officer’s gun, the second retired law enforcement officer working security fired, hitting and killing Ryan Askew.
A few hours a security officer was stabbed during a confrontation with a man at a convenience store in Montgomery Alabama and thirteen hours later, another security officer was shot dead in California.
The next day, and thousands of miles away, a military security officer shot and killed a trespasser in Anchorage Alaska after he breached security at a base used by Navy Seals.
And in Farmington NM, a man threatened to stab a mall security officer and was pepper sprayed.
He struggled with other security officers and is accused of biting a police officer’s fingers.
Derek Medina, 21, Kaley Medina, 23, and Daniel Serna, 37, are facing aggravated assault charges following the shooting that happened around 1:20 a.m. Sunday outside the Monte Carlo Club in San Antonio TX where they are accused of shooting a security officer.
After being asked to leave, they got into their vehicle and fired multiple gunshots hitting the security officer.
Over the weekend in Anderson SC, a man ejected from a nightclub tried to reenter and was stopped by a security officer who he then shot. The security officer has been hospitalized.
Also this past weekend, the reopening at a Riverside California nightclub turned into a deadly night of violence.
Two people were killed, and a security officer was injured in an exchange of gunfire early Monday outside El Calentano in the 10300 block of Arlington Avenue.
A member of a band playing at the nightclub said an altercation that started inside the club apparently spilled outside into a parking lot.
“A security officer kicked a guy out, so I guess the guy was mad or something,” said Eliud Torres. “The security guy was just doing his job.”
Witnesses told police a man left the club with a woman and opened fire after driving back to the front of the nightclub.
The security guard was shot in a leg, but returned fire, killing the shooter and the woman in the car, investigators said.
Each year more than 27,000 assaults of security officers are reported and more than 100 security officer deaths occur according to national statistics catalogued by Private Officer International.
