Community journalist recalls shooting at municipal board meeting that left three dead

Chris Reber

Public shootings become national news, and fodder for journalists who descend on towns to seek out survivors for first-hand accounts of what happened. Often, the reality of the horror is overshadowed by the need to get photos of people weeping or bloody, and to be the first to interview survivors or the family of victims.

But small-town journalist Chris Reber found himself on the other side of the news Monday when he went to a meeting to write a story, and a gunman entered the building and killed three people. Reber relayed his frightening experience to his editors at the Pocono Record in the 5,500-population town of Stroudsburg in eastern Pennsylvania, and his first-hand account was published in the paper, as written by editor Chris Mele. Reber's story wasn't sensationalized, but told from the honest point-of-view of someone who survived a nightmare.

In describing his experience, Reber said: "The thing that got my attention: plaster flying out, blowing out through the walls. Witnesses would later tell me they saw pictures exploding away from the walls. I heard more than 10 shots. It was automatic, like a string of firecrackers. That's what everyone said. I crawled out to a hallway and then got outside. There is nothing in reality you can compare it to. It just was not in reality. All I could think was: It wasn't happening to me...It wasn't real to me until I went back inside and saw people bleeding." (Read more)

The shooting suspect, whose property was filled with junk, was evicted last year, losing his property two weeks ago, and his shooting rampage was reportedly in response to that, as can be read in the Record here, here, here, and here.