Witness: School Shooter "Wasn't All There"

A gunman opened fire on an elementary school playground in the San Diego suburb of Carlsbad, Calif., on Friday afternoon. Police say Brendan O'Rourke parked his car outside of Kelly Elementary School, jumped a fence and began firing rounds at children in the school's playground.

Two students were hit in the arm before bystanders were able to apprehend O'Rourke.

Both children are expected to make full recoveries.

O'Rourke was arrested on suspicion of six counts of attempted murder and numerous weapons violations.

His motive remains a mystery.

But in an "Early Show on Saturday Morning" exclusive, Scott Chandler, one of bystanders who helped subdue the suspect, appeared on the broadcast from San Diego to talk about what happened and how he found himself at the right place at the right time.

Chandler is being praised as a hero because he helped track and hold the suspect down and secure his arrest by police.

Chandler told "Early Show" co-anchor Chris Wragge when he came face to face with the alleged gunman, he knew there was something wrong.

"Just looking into his eyes, he had the crazy look in his eyes. He wasn't all there," Chandler said.

Police Say School Gunman Not Cooperating

Chandler explained his proximity to the school was an important part of how quickly he found himself on the scene.

He said, "I've lived for probably 15 years across the street from the school. Both my daughters attended and graduated last year. So a pretty tight group of neighbors keep an eye of things, especially living right across the street from a school. I was working on a personal watercraft in my driveway around noontime and heard one of the first gunshots go off. A neighbor down the street works on a few cars. I thought maybe a car back-fired or whatnot. I looked to check and didn't see his truck down there and then heard another gunshot. Ran across the street."

Chandler said he thought it was all part of a school assembly or drill.

He said, "They do quite a bit of outside assemblies. They've got a great staff at this school and they do a lot of stuff outside and I was thinking it was some kind of assembly or, at first, a drill, a school shooting drill. I'm standing up and my house sits about 50 or 60 feet up on the hill so I'm looking down on the schoolyard."

At that point, Chandler said, "So, (the suspect) starts firing rounds. The kids, chaos, screaming, running, what looks to be when things clear, I see a few adults and gunman still firing. I start running downhill. There's about a eucalyptus tree about every 50 feet so I'm taking cover. ... This time I realize it is not a school drill, but something real. They are chasing the suspect actually starts running across the field to the fence where I was at, where I was running downhill. So, we all kind of met at the same spot. I was tucked, it might have been behind his vehicle at the time when he came over the fence, was -- at that time a black truck pulled up which I'm hearing now was another one of the construction workers that either hit him with the truck, knocked him to the ground. When I popped up behind possibly his vehicle, the construction workers that had been working on the school had him on the ground, subduing him. I -- I helped out at that time."

Chandler continued, "Once the two first patrol cars arrived and detained him into custody, I jumped the fence. I'm pretty good friends with the principal and asked her if she needed help to make sure the kids were safe. I then did a room-to-room visual inspection through the windows. Being it was lunchtime, some of the rooms were empty. The kids kind of scattered. I did come across a blood trail on the ground and called 911 to let them know there are injuries."

But what about the suspect?

Chandler said, "There was a lot of screaming and hard to tell who was screaming. I've heard different slurs he was saying from other neighbors but he was. At that time, put it this way, the construction workers I believe were all wearing steel-toed boots, and he took a pretty good beating. I looked at him eye to eye, what are you shooting at kids, what's your motive and what you are doing? He kind of grunted, didn't make any comments, just looking into his eyes, he had the crazy look in his eyes. He wasn't all there."