Grief, Shock Over Death Of Museum Guard

Washington Post: 39-Year-Old Stephen T. Johns Was Known For Courtesy And Friendliness

(Washingtonpost.com)  This story was written by Washington Post staff writers Christian Davenport and Paul Duggan
.

---

Colleagues called Stephen T. Johns "Big John," for he was well over 6 feet tall. But mostly friends recalled the security guard's constant courtesy and friendliness.

"A soft-spoken, gentle giant," said Milton Talley, a former employee of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, where Johns was killed yesterday in the line of duty -- shot, authorities said, by an avowed white supremacist who entered the museum with a rifle.

Details of the shooting remained sketchy last night, but apparently the 39-year-old, who was armed with a .38-caliber revolver, did not have time to react when James W. von Brunn walked into the museum, according to police sources.

"Immediately upon entering the front doors of the museum, he raised the rifle and started shooting," D.C. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said of von Brunn, 88, adding that he "was engaged by security guards, and there was an exchange of gunfire."

When the smoke cleared, von Brunn was critically wounded. The only casualty among the guards was Johns, who lived in Prince George's County. At least one bullet from a small-caliber rifle hit Johns in his upper-left torso, according to Johns's employer, the Wackenhut security company.

"Two other . . . armed security officers opened fire with their service revolvers," the company said. "The intruder was hit at once" and wounded.

Johns died at George Washington University Hospital.

"There are no words to express our grief and shock over these events," the museum said in a statement, describing Johns as "an outstanding colleague who greeted us every day with a smile."

Johns, a 1988 graduate of Crosslands High School in Temple Hills, lived in an apartment in the Temple Hills area. Friends said he had a son.

Allen Burcky, another former museum employee, said last night that workers there considered each other "like family" and that Johns was "very courteous, very helpful."

Lourdes Padilla, the mother of a close friend, said that Johns trained as a plumber but that she didn't think he had ever entered the trade. He remarried about a year ago, Padilla said.

Johns's sister, Jacqueline Carter, declined to comment as she entered her home in Temple Hills. "She's in bad shape right now," said a man who was driving her.

Wackenhut describes itself as the U.S. government's "largest contractor for professional security services." An official with the union that represents Wackenhut employees at the museum said Johns was paid about $20 an hour.

"It's a heavy loss," said Assane Faye, the Washington district director of the Security, Police and Fire Professionals of America.

Like other guards at the museum, on Raoul Wallenberg Place SW near the Mall, Johns underwent training for which he received the D.C. police designation of "special police officer," which permitted him to carry a revolver on duty.

Faye said that during contract negotiations with Wackenhut two years ago, the union pressed for company-issued protective vests. Although Wackenhut seemed open to the idea, vests have not been issued, Faye said.

"I hammered this in our negotiations two years ago because of how sensitive that museum is," he said. "Our guards needed more protection." He said that one of the guards at the museum was "verbally assaulted by one guy walking by, saying anti-Semitic remarks. For that reason, I made that the center of the negotiation."

Authorities said Johns was not wearing a protective vest.

Susan Pitcher, a Wackenhut spokeswoman, declined to comment on the shooting beyond the company's statement.

Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center and director of the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles, said officials at those institutions took immediate steps to enhance security after the shooting in Washington.

"The key component is not only to have your own security, but to work with the local police force," he said. "In our case, the LAPD has a very good grasp of where all sorts of extremists might be and are able to deploy very quickly."

William S. Parsons, the Holocaust museum's chief of staff, praised Johns and his colleagues.

"Never take your guard force or your security people for granted," Parsons said. "They did exactly what they were supposed to do."

[Rob459]

This is a horrible tragedy. But in order to keep it from becoming a much worse catastrophe, we need to keep it in perspective: it was one criminal killing one innocent person. Even if we include the recent killing of an abortion doctor and the shooting of soldiers by a muslim extremist, this is not indicative of a large-scale problem. These are very small isolated incidents in a nation of over 300 million people. To sensationalize these isolated crimes is to fan the flames of extremism, by further polarizing American society into two camps that cannot even begin to have a reasonable dialogue. Each concentrates more and more on largely imagined injustices by the other, until rational thought and intellectual reasoning play no part at all in their interactions.

And both sides are to blame. The political left is every bit as shameless in their lies and fear-mongering in order to mobilize their base as the political right is. This particular tragedy is a case in point. This man is not even remotely representative of most people on the right. He is an extremist. By definition, that puts him into an almost insignificant minority on the outer fringes. But, as is obvious just from comments we see here, the left sees him as indicative of the attitudes and desires of the political right.

And yet, right here on the CBS website, there is an editorial posted (without a comments section, curiously) calling for outright thought-crimes legislation, ala 1984. It is so acceptable to many on the left to use this incident to vilify the right, that a strongly implied call to repeal the First Amendment in order to silence the political right, to "round up" anyone who dares to even speak unsanctioned words, is actually being endorsed by a major media source. That is far more scary than all the extremist groups on all sides combined. But I've heard many on the left (and on the right, in relation to different specific words or lines of speech) advocate seriously for this same suspension of basic human rights, just to silence their political foes.

The threat that these extremists pose to our society is not in random acts of violence. It is in the willingness of the majority to over-react to them and give up our core values in order to feel that we're right.

[factsearcher]

Why do so many people have inherited the decision of hating minorities?
Does it make them feel ...what? They are better? Superior? Powerful?
Hatred is passed on from generation to generation.
We ALL come from the same ancestors! Way way back.
THe interesting thing is that minorities have proofed to overcome travesties and actually become more outstanding than the non minorities according to circumstances...
Is it envy?? fear?? inferiority complex? all of the above?
The white supremacist certainly qualify to be envious, fearsome and have inferiority complex.

[noloyalisti]

zzapperz just made my case for me. It is a sad commentary that so many ignorant people listen to this hate mongering garbage. Just look at what happened to zzapperz!!!!!!!!! Maybe we should get him (or her) on some watch list, they sound kind of crazy and dangerous like the folks on News for Dumb Fox.

[secularsurfer]

noloyalista i agree. the rightwingers have been dumbing america down since ronny raygun. all the right is good at is instilling fear and stoking hate. zzapperz comments are a perfect example.

[abarafi]

It is a shame that a piece of garbage like Von Brunn was allowed to walk the streets and breathe the air. He should have been put to death years ago. Unfortunately, even if he gets the death penalty, he's so old that he'll probably die of natural causes, first. That's a shame, too. I hope John's family sues his estate for every dime he has. Dogs that become unpredictably aggressive are put down. People like Von Brunn should be put down, too.

[noloyalisti]

We have a real terrorist problem here. It is a direct result of the takeover of the government of the people by big corporations who have dumber down America and turned it into an ignorant nation of "good Germans".

The electorate is largely uneducated. Until they realize that big corporations are funding the media and right wing hate mongers like Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly, to name only a few, there is no hope.