Police Officers Who Took Down Nashville Shooter Hailed as Heroes
“Hero Metro Nashville Police Officers Michael Collazo, 31, and Rex Engelbert, 27, have served in the department for nine and four years, respectively.”
Rex Engelbert and Michael Collazo are the Nashville police officers credited with taking down school shooter Audrey Hale on Monday.
Bodycam footage of the shooting has been released, and these officers are being praised for running toward the danger and ending it quickly.
FOX News has done a profile on the officers:
Rex Engelbert and Michael Collazo: Who are the Nashville officers who took down Covenant School shooter?
While a team of Nashville police officers swarmed a Christian school Monday morning to stop an active shooter, the department praised two of the responding officers, credited with taking down the suspect, by name.
Hero Metro Nashville Police Officers Michael Collazo, 31, and Rex Engelbert, 27, have served in the department for nine and four years, respectively. The department declined to make either of them available for an interview on Tuesday.
Collazo, a Marine Corps veteran and former firefighter, also responded to the Christmas Day bombing in 2020, his sister said Tuesday. He is also the father of a young girl himself.
Engelbert, one of the first officers on scene, is shown on bodycam video calmly retrieving his rifle from the back of a police SUV as a teacher outside explains the situation.
“[He’s] obviously very brave, braver than I ever imagined,” Deanna Collazo DeHart, his older sister, told Fox News Digital. “He really does love his job. When I sit and think about all the training and all the different classes that he does, and all the family events that he’s had to miss because of training or leaving to go through this training or this class… it all really does pay off.”…
Speaking separately at a news briefing Tuesday, Nashville Police Chief John Drake said Collazo had also served as a SWAT team paramedic.
He was born and raised in Nashville, joined the Marine Corps right out of high school and told his parents hours after the shooting that he drew heavily from his military training during the ordeal, according to DeHart.
These brave men deserve the praise they are receiving.
MNPD Officers Rex Engelbert, a 4-year veteran, and Michael Collazo, a 9-year veteran, were part of a team of first responders to the Covenant campus Mon morning. They fired on the active shooter, who was killed. This is their body camera footage. https://t.co/17qsZM6bNp pic.twitter.com/g4b0nMTFRD
— Metro Nashville PD (@MNPDNashville) March 28, 2023
These are the victims:
These are the victims of yesterday’s anti-Christian terror attack: pic.twitter.com/beqrFw7nxX
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) March 28, 2023
In case you missed it, this is the bodycam footage of the event:
Nashville Police have released the bodycam footage and it cannot be stressed enough how remarkable this response was. These men are absolute heroes. pic.twitter.com/aOT8IJyH04
— Sara Gonzales (@SaraGonzalesTX) March 28, 2023
If that video won’t play, here’s another:
🚨BREAKING🚨
Nashville School Shooting Police Body Cam Footage Released: pic.twitter.com/p75x1ePpWG
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) March 28, 2023
The Nashville Police Department deserves credit for releasing this footage so quickly.
Now, if only the public could see the manifesto the shooter left behind.
Featured image via YouTube.
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Comments
Rex Engelbert is a pretty sweet name for a cop. You could totally use that in a TV show.
“Humperdink. Humperdink. Humperdink!”
The should not release the names of the cops. It might cause some wack job to take a pot shot at him.
Exactly…. the Radical Lethal Left now have their targets. This isn’t the USA anymore… it’s a banana republic where the cops have to where masks…. just like the rest of us… but to protect against severe lead infection. We are fast coming to the lines in “The Untouchables” about tit for tat. With FJoe Biden and Brother Merrick more concerns with looking the other way, the dogs of war are let slip.
Given that (I agree with you), where do you think we’ll be in November of 2024?
The radical left is now an arm of our government, no less than the Brownshirts were.
We ain’t making it to Nov 2024. There’ll either be martial law or the Union will disintegrate no less than the Soviet Union.
I doubt it. We are still 50 separate states. Federal control doesn’t run as deep as you imagine.
Federal control: National Guard
Coast Guard
FBI
NSA
IRS
Dept of Education …armed and dangerous (humor aside)
Blue States
States: Militias (organized and unorganized)
State and local police
DMV (humorless)
Runs deep enough.
How do you avoid that? Criminal investigations are a matter of public record. How do you keep their identities secret without allowing the access due to the public?
Names are one thing…. pictures are another. As I said…a banana republic. ..now. In the past… no problem.
Those were excellent first and subsequent shots – right on target, and under incredible stress and surprise. Rex turned that corner, immediately his sights and down the murderer went. Michael’s handgun follow-up was also just as exemplary.
Fine motor skills go out the window with adrenalin dump. Training makes a big difference. The AR had a Vortex LPVO and the handgun had red dot sights… time savers in variable lighting conditions. The last four shots had to be done as the fight wasn’t over. Good training…clear tactical thinking and action. This is the most dangerous situation… seeking out and neutralizing armed assassin in room to room CQB.
practically textbook–an instant to scan the background, resolve the front sight, squeeze
They pulled the trigger, but all the officers in the camera footage acted professionally, and put their lives on the line to stop this turd. Make Uvalde officers watch this side by side with how they responded and tell them “This is how a hero reacts. This is how a zero reacts.”
Like this meme.
They also kept on alert for a potential secondary threat “outrider”. They didn’t let their guard down until all clear. Gun handling and communications were excellent. They were clearing the place with a minimum of back-up which is no small deal.
It’s a news story about the news. I myself hadn’t given the issue a second’s thought.
Really? I’m so sick to my stomach I can’t stand it, those precious beautiful souls
Clickbait is designed for you, then.
There’s a rather long history of ordinary guys racing into danger. Act like you’ve been there before, is the usual advice.
Heroes they are, but we have to be careful about mythologizing real people. Real life isn’t an action movie. Having to kill another human being in the line of duty is traumatizing for the shooter, no matter what their training or how many times they’ve done it.
I hope these men are given all the appropriate commendations, and then a good spell out of the limelight with their families and whatever support they need to process this. They saved countless lives.
Usually I would not put into hero status. They are consummate professionals doing their job to the utmost. That said…. they had on only flack jackets and moved into battle beyond what would be “standard” Uvalde prepping.
Hopefully we don’t overdo it to the point they can’t get help for themselves.
Killing even a monster is a highly traumatic experience.
True…but the support is going to be strong and it was a righteous action.
It is that. Both men will need some time to recover.
Hats off to those guys, video looked like they knew what they were doing.
Would hope they feel no remorse, woman was evil gunning down children.
Definitely hats off to these guys. I also read an article this morning about how one of the ladies killed, I think she was the school headmaster, dropped her zoom call and immediately ran to the intruder as soon as she heard the first shot. She was unarmed and was killed.
It’s one thing to confront a shooter when you are also armed, another thing altogether to run towards the gunfire when you’re not even armed. Mamma bear laid it all down for the kids, God bless her soul.
It’s one thing to confront a shooter when you are also armed, another thing altogether to run towards the gunfire when you’re not even armed. Mamma bear laid it all down for the kids, God bless her soul.
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valor in the flesh–without regard for her own life, she rushed to defend her students
a act deserving of the medal of freedom if ever there was one
Who are these anti-gun ghoul to tell someone who would do that, that she can’t have a gun if she thinks that would help her do better for her kids?
I’m pretty presumptuous in general, but I, myself, would never presume as they do.
So long as the praise is for charging towards the gunfire, or rushing to save lives, unlike the Coward County folk, the hero label is more than fair.
That being said I believe I’ve seen the hero label applied somewhere for the killing of Hale. While doubtless necessary, the taking of her life shouldn’t be considered heroism but a sad duty.