Traverse City, Mich.
Even so, she didn’t think much about disturbance, assuming there was a fight some halls. When she folded the corner, she saw a man running down another hall, and then saw her knife.
Eleven people, from 29 to 84 years old, were injured in a sharp attack in the traffic store City on Saturday, and a suspect was arrested.
Bradford James Gille, 42, was quickly subjected by other buyers and detained when a deputy arrived, said the Sheriff of the Grand County Traverse.
The man passed by someone closer and “at my angle,” said Martell, 32, to NBC News. “And that was when I reserved it down the hall.”
She said the man seemed “crazy” and focused on the laser to go out. She said she does not believe that she was an objective or that she even particularly caught the attention of man, but that she was not injured because she left the road on time.
The authorities have said that Gille acted alone and that the attack seemed to be random, without predetermined victims.
Martell stopped running when he found a group of others, which is when, he said, fear was put: “Because I had no idea where the person was.”
“All I know is that I saw a knife, and I escaped from the knife, and now I have no idea where the knife is,” Martell said.
“I’m still sitting and dealing with the weight of realizing that it was a moment of life or death,” Martell said. She said she is “surreal” that was there when it happened, especially in retrospect, after seeing all the news coverage.
“It could have been easily next,” he said.
When leaving the store, at least two men who had stab injuries. One, he said, was an old man and complained about his heart. The other made a joke about the need for a curite.
The authorities have said that the good Samaritans in the store submitted the attacker before the officers arrived and could arrest him. Martell said that was happening to the other side of the store from where it ended.
Michael Miller, 34, said he was one of those people.
He, along with his fiancee, Julia Ling, 27, and four of her children, listened to what they described as shouts that extend through the blood when they entered the Walmart.
Ling grabbed the young women and threw them behind a bread grid. “Anything to block it from them,” he said.
But Miller ran towards the action to help, he said.
Ling said he saw the man stabbed a victim in the product section, then another for the auto-checkout, before he ran towards her and her children.
“He pounced towards us,” News told NBC. Then, he said, he pounced in Miller, and the group trying to prevent him from pushing him through the door.
The outside group led the attacker to the ground, and Miller called 911, he said.
The officers arrived in a matter of minutes, Miller said. Once they were on the scene, he helped the first to respond to locate all injured victims, he said.
Miller said that he and some other men around him “reacted at the same time and reacted in the same way” to the attacker, allowing them to work together to submit it.
“I think we all saw each other. We all noticed and saw what was happening,” said Miller. “I mean, definitely something that I think everyone was a little together.”
Miller and Ling called for the events of the day a “attention call” and expressed concern about bringing their children to errands with them, especially when the other is busy and one of them has to go alone. Ling said he has already begun to think about making plans to go when Miller is at home house.
But both have some faith in their community after so many spectators worked together to stop violence.
What Miller “kept telling me after the fact was’ I just did what anyone should have done,” said Ling.
“It should be so,” Miller added.
Michigan prosecutors seek a position for terrorism against Gille, the suspect, in addition to 11 assault positions with the intention of killing, one for each stabbed victim.
All victims received attention at Munson Medical Center, where all but one remain hospitalized. Munson Healthcare spokeswoman, Catherine Dewey, said eight of the victims are in fair conditions and two are in serious condition. Everyone is expected to survive.
