2 minutes before being shot Holly takes a great big lick
of her Rocky Road ice cream. She giggles self-consciously as it drips over her hand,
because her father, James, is watching her, grinning while shaking his head.
“Slow down Holly!” says Jessica, Holly’s mother. Holly tells her it’s not her fault
it’s melting. It’s just too hot today. The Robinson family is having the time
of their lives on vacation in Florida. This is a dream come true for the working-class family from
Cleckheaton, West Yorkshire, in northern England. Despite constant negative news
in the US about Florida, for this family, it’s a place of sheer beauty and wonder.
They’ve already visited Walt Disney World in Orlando, and of course, Holly had about
100 photos taken with her favorite pair of Disney characters, Mickey and Minnie Mouse.
It’s been the perfect holiday so far for the two parents who worked ungodly hours for years
to get to America. It was worth it. The US is everything and more than they expected it to be.
They’d heard that some parts of Florida could be dangerous for tourists at night,
and they’re old enough to remember the couple also
from West Yorkshire who was shot by a gang while on vacation there.
The unfortunate married couple was just resting on the side of the road in their
rental car when they were blasted with bullets. Totally innocent people who just didn’t want to
hand over all their holiday savings. The guy died and the woman survived,
and after it was reported, it made British folks think twice about vacationing across the pond.
That was back in 1993. It was all over the British press, more so because nine foreign tourists had
been murdered in Florida in the space of just one year. Street gangs were everywhere back then,
but the Robinsons have been told that the US is much safer now and as long as they stay
away from just a few no-go areas in Florida, they definitely won’t meet with any trouble.
And if you were to stop them in the street and ask them at this very minute,
they would tell you that the US is not as dangerous as everyone makes it out to be. Just
about every American they’ve met so far has been more than friendly. People have been so welcoming,
from the staff at the hotel to the folks they’ve met in the streets. “Americans,” said
Jessica after just a few days, “are waaaay more friendly than Brits.” James couldn’t agree more.
So, as they walk down Ocean Drive on South Beach in Florida’s famed Miami Beach,
they are not exactly on their guard.
This stretch of road is utterly amazing, with its pretty white buildings looking
so cute compared with the grim, grey buildings of the family’s town in industrial Yorkshire.
Holly licks her arm, where the dripped Rocky Road is now forming a series of veinous rivulets. “Ta
Da!” she says after she’s lapped up the last line. “Look dad, your sweet, lovely breath
vaporized my ice cream," she says sarcastically. James does have beer breath, from drinking earlier
at the nearby Irish pub. This will come back to haunt him big style, but not for a while yet.
1 minute before being shot
The Robinsons are right in some respects. Florida isn’t really that dangerous, not in the tourist
areas anyway, not usually. But on this day, it is.
Little do the Robinsons know that there’s gang beef being settled on
Ocean Drive on this particular day. That beef is
between a Haitian immigrant gang known as Zoe Pound and one of the Crips gangs.
Such gang beefs have led to a bunch of murders and drive-by shootings of late,
but the tourist areas are usually spared from such violence. The thing is, there’s a lot of
money to be made selling cocaine where tourism-focused nightlife is abundant,
and right now, these two gangs are in somewhat of a disagreeance when it comes to drug-dealing turf.
But they’ve arranged to meet in the day in what should be a safe,
crowded place to talk things over. It has to be said, though, that friendly dialogue and
diplomacy are not their strong points. At this very minute, a Zoe Pound gang member feels a
Crips gang member has insulted him. In reality, he is being what you might call overly sensitive,
but that’s all it sometimes takes for guns to be drawn. Mere words are spoken and…
BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG, BANG…BANG, BANG, BANG…BANG, BANG………..BANG, BANG, BANG…BANG.
Minute 1
Screams ring out on Ocean Drive as people run for cover. Gang members lay out on the street,
puddles of blood-forming below their close-to-dead bodies. You
can already hear a siren in the distance. Surely the cops can’t be coming already.
Minute 2
James Robinson has his daughter, Holly, cradled in his arms. Tears are streaming down his face.
He’s shouting, “Someone call an ambulance!” He isn’t even aware that he’s also been shot. “No,
no, no, no, no!” he cries. “Holly…Holly! Look at daddy, look at daddy!” Holly’s eyes are closed.
James doesn’t know if she’s unconscious or dead. Blood is all over him, leaking from Holly’s head.
He looks to his side and sees his wife Jessica down on the floor clutching her
stomach. At least she’s conscious, but she’s moaning and groaning.
Minute 3
James isn’t much of a reader, so before he and the family went to Florida, he knew little about
the fact 2021 was one of the worst years for US homicides with a firearm. There were around
21,000 deaths, covering murders, accidents, and homicides, all related to gun violence.
That number now stands at the peak of a line that has been traveling upwards for years.
You have to go back to 1994 to see numbers so high, but James didn’t know,
and he also wasn’t aware that the USA has the most heavily armed citizenry in the world.
Every year there are usually over 100 people who are shot and killed
by accident just because they stood close to where guns were fired.
James’s friends were wrong to tell him that the US is much safer now. The US is as violent,
or if you believe the statistics, much more violent than just a few years ago.
James doesn’t know it, but on the same weekend that he and his family are shot,
17 people are killed with a firearm across the whole country.
Minute 4
The police and an ambulance are already on their way. It’s at this point that James
realizes he’s also been hit. It has taken a while for the pain to register, but even now,
he only feels only a slight throbbing pain. This is partly because he’s in shock,
but it’s also because you can be shot in various parts of your body where the pain you feel isn’t
too bad at all. It’s just a good job he wasn’t shot in the kneecap because that really hurts.
Jessica, though, she’s been shot in a place that you really don’t want to be
shot in: the abdomen. She is in agony, so much agony that she can’t really help her
daughter and husband. She can’t seem to move, either. She doesn’t know it,
but she’s been hit in one of the worst places when it comes to complications.
She’s been shot by a high-velocity firearm, and that bullet was traveling at 2000 feet
per second when it entered her. The bullet has not hit any main arteries,
so she can be thankful for that. Still, this bullet has made its way into her intestines,
and right now acid and intestinal bacteria are leaking inside of her.
She has no idea that the injury to her peritoneum, which is a thin tissue that goes around the inner
wall of the abdomen and lines the abdominal organs, is not good news at all. In short,
all the bad stuff, the bile, feces, and all that nasty stuff that everyone has in
their stomachs is leaking out because this thin tissue has been damaged.
This can be bad, very bad. She’s at least breathing. In some cases,
a bullet to the abdomen can hit an artery and the person can go into cardiac arrest.
If that happened to Jessica, there’d be a 90% chance she wouldn’t get home to
tell all her buddies about Disney World and the photogenic Mickey Mouse. Still,
now she has sprung a leak, she could die from the sometimes-deadly peritonitis.
Minute 5
“Come on darling, open your eyes,” James keeps saying to Holly, who’s still not responsive.
“Where’s the ambulance,” he screams, as people now crowd around the family,
some taking photos and videos with their phones and already putting them online. As you’ll see,
while they’re doing this for all the wrong reasons, it can also be helpful.
James looks at Jessica, who has just collapsed into a heap. Now her groaning is faint,
and her face is pale. That’s because the reduced blood flow in her body means a decrease in the
number of red blood cells. This interrupted blood flow is also why she’s just slumped over.
Minute 6
The ambulance is here already, as are the cops. The paramedics head straight over to
the family and call for more paramedics once they see how many people are down. Right now,
two of the gang members are already dead. Some are injured and about 12 guys have run away.
Incidentally, when James was a teenager, he’d been stabbed in a disagreement over who was
the better football team: Leeds United or Huddersfield Town. Stabbings in the UK,
where guns aren’t as available, are often the go-to action when violence gets ugly.
It’s less dangerous than being shot, with about an 8 percent fatality rate
compared to one-third of people dying when they take a bullet or bullets.
If you just get shot in the heart your chances of surviving are pretty slim, with a fatality rate
of about 25 percent. Being stabbed there has a fatality rate of 12 percent. But you can be hit in
the leg or arm and not feel much, and then bleed out and die because the bullet has hit an artery.
One minute you’re wondering what just happened and the next you’re on the floor,
close to death. But another place you certainly don’t want to get shot is in the head.
Our little precocious Holly is experiencing that right now.
Minute 7
She is still unconscious as she’s placed into the ambulance. The paramedics are now looking
for other injuries, besides the obvious one in her head where they can see the entry
wound. There’s no exit wound, so the bullet is still inside of her. That’s very unfortunate.
Gunshot wounds to the head give you a 42 percent chance of survival,
but most of the survivors are hit in the extremities of the head,
so the bullet just glances off. Taking one right in the head and pulling through is very tough,
and even if you do survive, you might never be able to use a spoon again.
If you are shot in the head and the bullet penetrates the brain,
you have only a five percent chance of surviving. Fortunately for Holly,
she’s not been hit in the side of the head, which helps, as you’ll soon see.
But right now, the paramedics aren’t spending too much time speculating about the trajectory
of the bullet, just as they’ve learned in their training. All their efforts focus on keeping Holly
alive and looking for other injuries. They’ve also been very careful to survey the scene,
after all, more bullets could fly. They don’t know if the shooters are still around.
Holly is still breathing, but her neurological status is unresponsive. The paramedics palpate
her head and face, meaning examining it with their fingers, looking for deformities or any
leakages. They also check to see if her pupils react to light because non-reactive pupils can be
a sign of significant head trauma. In Holly’s case, there’s certainly is a bit of that.
Now they have set off, taking the fastest route to the nearest emergency room. Due
to the seriousness of the injuries, they are going a bit faster than the usual 70 to 80 MPH.
Minute 8
Jessica is now in the ambulance and paramedics are palpating her distended
stomach. Because it’s distended, they consider intra-abdominal bleeding. One of them writes down,
“Hemorrhage and possible spillage of gastrointestinal contents.”
She’s conscious and obviously, in a lot of pain, which further indicates a leak.
Her breathing is also shallow, so the paramedics open up her airways and give
her oxygen. As for the external hemorrhage, they focus on preventing more loss of blood.
She’s cleaned and her wound is covered to prevent infection, although there’s not
much they can do about the spillage inside of her and how that may cause a deadly infection.
While she’s given fluids intravenously, as well as antibiotics, she is not given
pain killers just yet because it can obscure diagnosis with such a possibly complicated
injury. Bullet wound injuries are most of the time complicated given that you
don’t know what damage a bullet traveling at high speed can do.
Anyway, Jessica is almost passed out right now.
Minute 15
It seems that James is the most fortunate member of the family,
although right now he wishes it was him that was the worst off,
not his daughter and wife. He’s actually chatting to the paramedics trying to explain to them what
happened. He still doesn’t really feel much pain. This is because, while we said bullet wounds are
usually complicated, James has been shot in his leg, and there’s a clear entry and exit
wound. The bone in his thigh, the nerves, and the major vessels are all undamaged.
The paramedics have wrapped up his wound but when he goes to the hospital, after having a thorough
check, he’ll be given some antibiotics and have what’s called surgical debridement. That’s
just the cleaning of the wound, removal of any dead tissue, and a bit of sewing up if necessary.
He’ll also have scans, of course, because the doctors will want to know what’s going on inside
as bullets can fragment into little splinters. They don’t want to patch him up if there is still
something inside of him. But James will be fine. Being shot has been a walk in the park for him,
which is quite unusual. His wife, though, is at risk, and his daughter,
well, she’s walking a tightrope in the wind while being pelted with bird poop.
Minute 18
We now have a crime scene. One thing all police are told about crime scenes
is they need to be preserved as much as possible. That means cordoning them off,
so there is minimal contamination. First responders approach them with caution,
looking around for any clues in the environment.
The first officer logs all the details, such as location, time, and the number of people
thought to be involved. They are also very aware of people leaving the scene, getting into cars,
stuff like that. And then they scan the actual scene, taking in any information
that might be relevant. They also look for any possible dangers that might still present,
and not just human danger, but things like weapons or even chemical threats.
In this case, people are still around, so the cops start interviewing any witnesses. They
allow the medical staff to do their job, but in doing that, they still try to keep
the scene as uncontaminated as possible. As this was a mass shooting in broad daylight,
the case shouldn’t be too hard to solve. It also involves a family, tourists no less,
so it will eventually become global news. That means a lot of pressure on the police.
One of the gang members is currently being tended to by the second team of paramedics,
and cops are also there to try and get what’s called a “dying declaration.” In this case,
the dying man looks up at the cop and says, “Screw you pig.”
Some of the people nearby are possible suspects and witnesses, so now the cops have them secured,
and they are all separated. That’s important. They have a saying in the
police in regard to crime scenes, and that’s “Identify, Establish, Protect, and Secure.”
They’ve also established possible routes of escape,
and right now police cars are scouring the streets where the shooters might
be. As for the men that are being put into the ambulances, cops have noted where they
where found. The same goes for any items at the crime scene. Their location is noted.
Minute 20
Detectives arrive on the scene and are briefed by the first responders.
They decide who they should call, i.e., forensic folks, legal counsel,
and people that might bring special equipment to the scene. IDs are taken from all the people
nearby. They also get any photos or videos that have been taken since the start of the incident.
Plus, as they are doing these so-called “Walk-Throughs” they are taking pictures
themselves. Several detectives do their own walk-throughs, always ensuring no evidence
is compromised. If the crime scene is even slightly compromised, it could result in
a gang member who took part in the shooting getting off and killing again in the future.
Soon they will remove some of the evidence, and ensure it’s preserved,
packaged, and safely transported, all the time being very careful about cross-contamination.
It will be sent to either an evidence storage facility or a crime laboratory.
Minute 25
The doctor treating Jessica has said after his visual evaluation and some abdominal
ultrasonography that peritonitis is present, but since bullets to the stomach can cause all kinds
of injuries to multiple organs, more checks will need to be done. He can’t see that with his eyes,
so now that she seems stable enough she’s sent to a room where she can have a multidetector CT scan.
There’s a very real chance that her peritonitis can lead to the sometimes-deadly sepsis,
and it most likely would lead to that if she wasn’t getting any treatment. It still could
anyway. Sepsis is a bodly process where your immune system is actually trying to help you.
It’s the body’s extreme natural response to fighting an infection. The body releases an
army of chemicals thinking it’s come to save the day, but the chemicals actually damage the
seemingly infected tissues, and this can lead to multiple organ failure and death.
The bad news is that abdominal sepsis is the worst sepsis, with a mortality
rate of a staggering 72 percent. Even among those released from the hospital,
only 30 percent of them survive the year. This is why Jessica is given a massive
dose of intravenous antibiotics to prevent sepsis from happening.
Minute 45
The scans look good, at least as good as it could look after being shot. The bullet
hasn’t damaged any other of Jessica’s organs, but she will still need surgery to remove the
bullet and fix that hole inside of her. It’s Holly now, who’s in a really bad way.
Minute 90
The detectives do another walk-through, what’s sometimes called a “final survey.”
All the evidence they have will become part of a “case file”,
as will forensic and technical reports made by experts in the near future.
Sometimes these files will fill many boxes, but other times, this kind of crimes are
much easier to solve. Still, guilty men have gotten away with murder because of bad case
files or contaminated evidence, and sometimes innocent men go to prison for the same reason.
We’ll tell you later if the Robinsons get the justice they deserve.
Minute 120
If you get shot in the side of the head the bullet will very likely kill you,
and even if it doesn’t, the damage to the brain will be vast and the person
might live on in a vegetative state or with severe physical and mental disabilities.
The best brain injury caused by a bullet, if we can say that,
is when only part of one of the two halves of the brain are damaged. That’s still not good.
You can’t really get away with a brain injury of any kind, even just a nick.
The bullet has indeed stuck itself inside of Holly’s head, so she has what’s called a
penetrating wound. Her brain has been scanned once again, and the good news is there is no severe
blood clotting. There is some swelling, but not so much that she will not get through the night.
Sometimes this kind of swelling can kill you faster than you’d expect. She’s in intensive
care right now and will be for some time. Doctors just have to keep a keen eye on her.
Day 2
Jessica is already sitting up in bed and talking. The antibiotics are working their
magic, even though she’s still in a bit of pain. Morphine takes care of
most of that. At the moment, she’s doesn’t feel well enough to go see her daughter,
although James, who is walking about as normal, fills her in on the details.
They still don’t know how things will turn out. Holly is in an induced coma after just coming back
from surgery to have the bullet removed. People are put in induced comas to slow the body down.
This lessen the demand for glucose, oxygen, and blood, and allows the swelling go down.
She’s a lucky girl. As you know, 95 percent of head shots that lead to brain injury result
in death, but of those that do make it to the emergency room still breathing,
there’s still a 50 percent chance they won’t make it. The fact Holly is still alive is a miracle.
Day 15
Holly looks up from her hospital bed. Mummy and daddy look really funny. She
can’t see right. Bits are missing. This is because she has damage to the right
hemisphere of the brain. The doctors actually told James and Jessica that
what’s actually happened is a “best-case scenario” when you consider brain injuries.
Holly’s spatial awareness is all off. She has problems remembering things and is often
confused. She’s also acting weird, like she just can’t interpret the emotions of others
at all. Sometimes she just completely ignores what’s in her left field of vision and when
asked about that she doesn’t seem able to form a proper reply. She still has her sense of humor,
but that sense of irony she used to have is all but gone. There will be no sarcasm for now.
But amazingly, this is the worst of the damage, besides some weakness in her left arm and hand.
Day 200
The police already have three men in custody. But, what do you think they have been charged with,
in the case of the Robinsons. After all, it was an accident. They didn’t wanna kill no Brits.
Well, there are quite a lot of degrees of murder and sometimes very similar crimes
will result in different charges and convictions. In this case,
the police are saying there was “transferred intent” to murder.
With transferred intent, it means the killer was trying to kill someone else,
but an innocent person was hurt. The intent to murder someone was still there,
though, so in this case, it’s attempted murder with transferred murder. Also,
because the guys used guns in a street where there were lots of people,
in legal terms, you can say they acted with extreme indifference to human life.
Whatever the case, they will be spending much of the rest of their lives in prison.
Day 365
“Have you done your homework,”
Jessica shouts in the direction of Holly’s bedroom in their small house back in Cleckheaton.
“Have you become bored of asking me the same questions all the
time,” Holly responds with a smile on her face.
She’s not quite back to normal yet, still having problems with her vision, her attention, and often
saying the wrong things in social situations, but the rehabilitation has helped a lot.
James and Jessica are happy about that,
but not so happy about having to sell the house. Holly’s treatment alone cost
just over $400,000. That’s on top of all the medical expenses they had to pay in the US.
All medical treatment in the UK is free, the same doesn’t apply to the US,
where healthcare costs are the most expensive in the world. Being poor, the Robinsons only bought
the cheapest travel insurance in the UK, and naturally, they didn’t read the small print.
Now the insurance company is refusing to pay out, invoking a clause in the contract about
“recklessness” and “intoxication”. The report from the hospital revealed that
Jessica and James had alcohol in their blood, which was true, they’d had a few
pints at Finnegan's Way bar on Ocean Drive earlier that day. Because of a few pints
the insurance company is refusing to pay any of their medical bills. Always read the small print!
From now on, say the Robinsons, they’ll be staying on this side of the pond, even if the
buildings are gray and old and there’s no such thing as an obesity-causing burger for 99 cents.
Now you to watch “Degrees of Murder - What Do They Mean?” Or, have a look at…