Church Security Plan Lessons From a Small Town

Article Summary

A church doesn’t have to be the target to become the scene of a shooting. Some violence gives your team no chance at prevention, and the person behind it may not share your limits. When that happens, your church security plan decides how well your people react.

What happened in LaBelle?

On Monday night, October 12, an 18-year-old was shot and killed in the parking lot of El Faro Assembly of God in LaBelle, Florida. The church was closed at the time and wasn’t the target.

The victim was walking through the neighborhood with three friends when a truck pulled up near the church. The driver had a prior issue with him, and the two started fighting. The passenger in the truck, also 18, had brought a gun.

Investigators say the passenger shot the victim in the fight, then fired at his three friends as they ran. Rounds shattered a church window and struck a shed a few feet away. When Hendry County deputies arrived around 7:40 p.m., someone was performing CPR in the parking lot. The victim died at the scene. The shooter faces one count of homicide and three counts of attempted homicide.

Why didn’t it stop at a fistfight?

During questioning, the shooter told detectives he carried a gun because it’s “a cruel world.” Later, he asked deputies a question of his own: “If your boy was getting beat, what would you have done?”

A sergeant answered, “Not kill someone.”

His response: “That’s cause you a b****.”

That exchange is a lesson. For most people reading this, the sergeant’s answer is obvious. Simply seeing a friend lose a fight doesn’t put killing on the menu. For this person, it was the next logical step, and holding back was what a weak person would do.

Much of church safety training focuses on the attacker who planned for months, someone radicalized over time who picked a target and studied it. Those attackers are real, and your plan should account for them. The person accused in LaBelle planned nothing beyond carrying a gun. He had a friend losing a fight and a weapon within reach, and he saw no line between the two.

Your team needs to train with that person in mind. When a team member sees two young men squaring off in your lot, assume it may not stay a fistfight. You can’t count on someone else stopping where you would stop. They may not carry the same moral brakes you do. Your people should keep their distance and move members away accordingly.

What if it had been Sunday morning?

Move the clock to 9 a.m. on a Sunday. Now the lot is full. Cars are pulling in, families are walking toward the doors, and kids are running ahead of their parents. On Monday night, the rounds that missed found a window and a shed. On a Sunday, the shooter would have been firing at people running across a lot full of your members.

Most of what we teach and train for sits on the front end. We want teams to spot trouble early and keep it away from their people. This type of incident doesn’t give the church a chance at that. When something like this happens during a service, your team isn’t preventing anything. You’re reacting, and how well you react gets decided weeks earlier, when your team builds its church security plan and trains on it.

What should a church security plan cover?

A good church security plan answers a few questions before anyone needs the answers.

Who is watching the parking lot? Put a team member outside during arrivals and dismissals, with a radio. That person will see a confrontation building between cars well before anyone inside hears a raised voice. Their job is to get the word inside fast.

Who can tell people to stay put? Decide now who has the authority to call a lockdown, not in the middle of an event. Then decide how the word spreads, whether by radio, the PA, or a phrase your greeters know. With gunfire outside, move people away from the exterior doors and windows on that side of the building.

What does the 911 caller say? Designate someone to make the call. They give the address, the side of the property, and the nearest entrance. A second person meets law enforcement and tells them where the injured are and which way the shooter went.

Who handles the wounded? When deputies arrived in LaBelle, someone was already attempting CPR in the lot. On a Sunday, that person could be someone from your team who knows what to do. Gunshot wounds call for bleeding control first. Keep kits where your team can reach them, and train people to use them. Here’s what to do in the first 5 minutes of a medical emergency.

The planning doesn’t end when the shooting stops

Part of your property becomes a crime scene. A memorial may appear on your grounds, as one did in LaBelle the next day, and reporters will call. Decide ahead of time who speaks for the church and how you update your members. Think through how you’ll treat a grieving family that shows up in your parking lot.

Key Takeaways

• A church can become the scene of violence it had nothing to do with. In LaBelle, a fight between two people ended in gunfire in a church lot while the building sat closed.
• Don’t assume an attacker shares your moral limits. The accused saw a gun as a fair answer to a friend losing a fight and called restraint weakness.
• Treat a fight in your parking lot as something that can turn deadly, and move members away from it early.
• When prevention isn’t possible, your reaction is only as good as your church security plan. That means lockdown authority, a clear 911 call, and trained people with bleeding control kits.