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8 “I came to kill you.”
- University of North Texas Press
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112 chapter eight “I came to kill you.” “I did what I did and now I have jobs to finish; I still have people I want to kill.” —Abdelkrim Belachheb quoted by his friend Mohamed I As the red taillights of Belachheb’s white station wagon faded and disappeared to the north, seven of his victims lay on Ianni’s floor bleeding to death—or already dead. Terry Rippa was the first to return to the barroom. “And nobody was in the bar at all, and I went down and checked with John and he was conscious, and then I walked up to the front and I did not check pulses or anything. It was quite a mess—the tables, broken glass, and the victims—and I checked on all five the best I could by observing, and they all appeared to be dead except for a few minutes later Marcell was moving .”1 With his military medical training on his mind, John McNeill thought he was going to bleed to death in a matter of minutes. But he was surprisingly alert. “That son-of-a-bitch was in Farfallo’s an hour or two before,” he told Terry. “Just hold on,” Terry replied. Barbara Watkins, who hid under the piano during the second round of shootings, had already checked on John. But she was in a state of near-hysterics, and John told her that she couldn’t help “I CAME TO KILL YOU” • 113 him. He said that he was probably bleeding to death and that she should call an ambulance. Barbara decided to make that call from Cappuccino’s. Barbara had to run through the aisle between the rows of tables and the bar to get out of Ianni’s. In her way lay Marcell, Linda, and Ligia. “In order to get out the door, I had to step over the bodies. And the blood was all over the floor, you know, real thick. And I thought, I guess one of my main thoughts was, ‘if I slide and fall, I’ll never get up again.’” But Barbara did make it out through the front door. A bartender named Pam* remembers Barbara entering Cappuccino’s. “She came in hysterical, grabbing her head, and all she could blurt out was that people had been shot. Then she started to fall down.” “Where?” asked an astonished Pam. “Ianni’s,” answered Barbara before she collapsed.2 Others had already called for help. Sherlyn, the singer, was on the phone with the Farmer’s Branch Police Department as the second round of shots was being fired. As she remained hidden under the desk in the office, some of those outside returned after Belachheb drove away. Richard Jones, the bartender, thought to use the same phone Sherlyn was already on. When he reached for it under the desk he touched Sherlyn and “scared the living daylights out of her.” Sara, who earlier during the evening had danced with Belachheb and refused his advances, called as well. Two Dallas police officers, Thomas Hall and Catherine Arnott, were patrolling northwest Dallas at that time. They arrived at 12:21 A.M., five minutes after Sherlyn’s frantic call. Several Ianni’s customers were running around the parking lot searching for friends they had lost during the melee. Most were afraid to go inside. Arnott was the first to enter. Terry Rippa witnessed her entrance. “The first officer that came in was a female. She was up front with her gun pulled and everything. I yelled at her ‘He’s gone’. She stepped around the bodies and put her gun up and came around the back and walked up to me and hugged me.” [54.234.143.240] Project MUSE (2024-03-29 16:46 GMT) 114 • CHAPTER EIGHT Soon, other police officers, at least thirty more, including a tactical team, arrived. Medics checked out the bodies at 12:27 A.M. Terry pointed to John and told them, “Why don’t you help this guy first? At least he is alive.”3 They set up a triage, but only two victims had any chance of being saved. Within seconds John McNeill was on his way to a hospital. He had not felt anything, at first. Then he was overwhelmed with excruciating pain. Ironically, the only other victim still alive was Belachheb’s first target and the catalyst for the carnage—Marcell Ford. Norman, one of the musicians, remembers Marcell saying, “Get some help. Get...