The violence began about 2:30 a.m. on Saturday, May 6, 2023.
Bars had just closed in the Short North entertainment district of Columbus following one of the busiest nights of the year, Cinco de Mayo. Crowds of young, intoxicated partygoers poured onto the street, winding their way up and down the sidewalks on the first warm weekend evening of spring.
Because the area had experienced a spike in late-night violence, there were plenty of police around too, including Columbus Police Officers Carl Harmon, Jake Velas and Ian Mansperger.
Officers Harmon and Velas were on foot providing security for a team of City of Columbus food-truck license inspectors when a shooting occurred just a few blocks south of their location, in the 600 block of N. High Street.
As cruisers raced past them to the shooting scene, Harmon and Velas heard on their radios that two large groups of shooters were engaged in a running gun battle and fleeing in their direction.
But Harmon and Velas soon had trouble of their own when they happened upon a large group of young adults taunting each other outside the United Diary Farmers store at 900 N. High St.
Fights soon broke out, but there were too many people and too many hot tempers for the two officers to restore order. If anything, the mayhem became more frenzied – the drama and tension recorded vividly by the officers’ body cameras.
Recognizing that the chaos was out of their control, and that they were on their own and without the benefit of cruisers in the immediate area to seek cover or to withdraw, Harmon requested cars to respond and assist from any adjacent zone. Video footage from Harmon’s body camera would later show Velas saying to his colleague, “It’s just us, buddy.”
Mansperger, who was working special security duty at the SeeSaw Club a block away, heard Harmon’s call and ran to help. No sooner had he arrived than “an explosion of gunfire” rang out, as Chief Elaine Bryant would later describe it.
Commotion devolved into chaos as people ran for their lives, screaming at the steady pop, pop, pop of gunfire. Others crouched behind poles, cars, walls – whatever cover they could find. Bullets ricocheted off the façades of luxury condos and shattered the plate-glass windows of restaurants and stores.
Harmon, Velas and Mansperger immediately ran across the street toward the suspects, who numbered between 15 and 20 in two opposing groups. They identified the active shooters and opened fire, and several suspects shot back.
Harmon and Velas, being infantry veterans of Afghanistan and Iraq respectively, recognized that the return fire was dangerously accurate; they could feel the pressure change in their ear drums from rounds passing by their heads and saw shots sparking around their feet.
As Harmon reached the west side of North High Street, he saw that the primary suspect was on the ground, badly wounded, his gun thrown to the side. But as Harmon and Velas scanned for additional threats, the downed suspect raised a pistol and fired three to four shots from less than 10 feet away, one of which can be heard on body camera striking just inches from Velas.
Harmon re-engaged the suspect with a volley of fire, took cover, reloaded, then engaged again. Mansperger, who had been chasing a suspect on West 1st Avenue, heard the renewed gunfire and ran to assist.
Once the threat was over, Mansperger kicked the pistol away from the gunman as Harmon secured his suspect and Velas attended to a woman screaming in pain nearby. All three radioed for medics, rendered aid, and remained with the wounded until help arrived.
In total, 10 people were shot and two were killed. Hundreds of rounds were fired, and 13 guns recovered. Two citywide “Officer in Trouble” calls were issued during the mayhem to request every available officer to respond.
Columbus Police Lt. Brian Steele, president of FOP Capital City Lodge #9, said it was the most chaotic event he had seen in 20 years as a police officer. And retired Detective John Witherspoon, one of the people who nominated Harmon, Velas and Mansperger for this award, said it was amazing that “after more than a hundred rounds being fired, no innocent bystanders were injured.”
Chief Bryant addressed that point at a news conference shortly after the shooting: “Our officers are extremely well trained. They know when to shoot and when not to shoot. I couldn’t have asked for a better way for the officers to respond to this incident.”