Bystanders tackle man with a gun after Kansas City Chiefs parade shooting

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (Gray News) - Paul Contreras helped tackle a man with a gun after the Kansas City Chiefs parade shooting on Wednesday.

“I just heard somebody yelling to ‘stop this guy, tackle him’ and he was coming in the opposite direction, so I just, you don’t think about it. It’s just a reaction,” he told CNN on Wednesday.

Contreras said that when he tackled the man, a gun fell out of his hand or sleeve.

His daughter, Alyssa Marsh-Contreras, took a video of police stepping in to arrest the man after her father tackled him to the ground.

Other people came to help him hold the man down.

“I take him down and I’m putting all my body weight on him and then another good Samaritan comes over and is helping me because I kind of got him high and the other guy gets him around his waist and we are just putting our weight on him,” Contreras said. “He’s just fighting to get up, but we’re fighting to keep him down and another good samaritan comes over and put his weight on us and we’re waiting for the cops to show up.”

Marsh-Contreras says it all happened so fast.

“I think the most alarming thing was when we saw cops chasing people and then seeing a young teenager kid just completely coming at us and then noticed just everybody in the crowd just kind of scatter and run, and that’s when I knew, ‘OK, something wasn’t right,’” she said.

Marsh-Contreras says she did not leave her dad’s side.

“Who knew what could’ve happened or if they needed help so I was just there to make sure, you know, his hat, his phone, his wallet, didn’t go missing in the process of him getting this offender down,” she said.

Contreras says that although the incident was probably 15 or 30 seconds, it felt like a long time.

“He was fighting the whole time you know? Fighting the whole time and we were fighting him to keep him down. We didn’t want to let him up and take off flying because he had one gun, he may have had another one in that big, bulky jacket,” he said.

Contreras says he did not see the man shoot the gun and police have not confirmed if the person in the video is one of the three people they have detained in connection to the shooting. Police say two of the people they detained are juveniles.

Soon after the parade to celebrate the Kansas City Chiefs Super Bowl win, gunshots rang out outside Union Station despite there being more than 800 police officers in the building and nearby. The shooting appeared to stem from a dispute between several people, authorities said Thursday.

One person was killed and 22 were wounded. The injured victims ranged between the ages of 8 and 47. Half of the injured victims are under 16.

“I’m angry at what happened today. The people who came to this celebration should expect a safe environment,” Kansas City Police Chief Stacey Graves said.

Radio station KKFI said on Facebook that Lisa Lopez-Galvan, host of “Taste of Tejano” and mother of two, was killed in the shooting.

“This senseless act has taken a beautiful person from her family and this KC Community,” KKFI said in a statement, according to the Associated Press.

Andy Reid and other coaches and staff were all ed for and the Kansas City Chiefs football team was on buses returning to Arrowhead Stadium at the time of the shooting, according to the Associated Press.

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