FLASHBACK 2010: How 9 Utahns survived being shot 

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Spider Break: Travis Morgan
Two weeks after graduating from in-house police academy in 2000, rookie Travis Morgan and his field officer received a burglary-in-progress call.

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Another officer was already at the corner house where the burglary was taking place when Morgan and his partner turned onto the street. “The guy was just pulling out of the driveway. He saw us and took off,” Morgan recalls. The alleged burglar turned another corner and crashed into a parked car. “We got out, went up to his car and tried to get him to come out. I was on the passenger’s side. Somehow, he got away from the officers on the driver’s side and ran back down the street we had just driven up. We took off after him,” Morgan says.

As Morgan caught the suspect and tried to tackle him, “he was holding up his pants with his right hand and all I can figure is that he pulled a gun from a waistband or pocket with his left hand,” Morgan recalls. “He put the gun over his shoulder, and as I went to grab him and we collided, the gun hit my jaw, and he pulled the trigger. I don’t remember feeling the shot, but I heard the pop. I felt that my jaw wasn’t closing right and blood was coming out.” Morgan fell and rolled, pulling his gun out to shoot the suspect. Just then, his partner jumped on top of the man.

En route by ambulance to the University Medical Center, Morgan asked himself three things: “Can I think? Can I breathe? Can I talk?” Realizing he could do all three, he thought he would live. At the hospital, he learned that the bullet had hit his jaw and shat tered. “There are still pieces of it in my jaw,” he says. The result was a “spider break” that left small cracks everywhere but didn’t shatter the jaw into pieces. “My jaw was wired shut for 2 1/2 months—that was the worst part. I couldn’t eat very well and lost 25 pounds— everything I ate needed to be blended and some things wouldn’t blend. At first, no one understood me, but I got so I could talk.”

He was able to find a silver lining, however. “My wife was 8 1/2 months pregnant with our first child when I was shot. She had to have a C-section and was laid up for a couple of months and couldn’t lift things. But I was home to do everything.” (CC)

Fighting Through It: Lt. Phil Murphy
A quarter-inch and everything would’ve drastically changed in Lt. Phil Murphy’s life.

On April 17, 2005, Murphy, a police officer since 1984, was dispatched, along with Sgt. Barry Nielson, to a domestic violence call at a residence in south Orem. Arriving on the scene, it was eerily quiet, but Murphy saw bruises around the neck of alleged perpetrator David Burns’ live-in girlfriend. They wanted to make an arrest, but were unaware of Burns’ martial-arts background.

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The minute the handcuffs came out, things escalated. Burns moved away, looking to escape, so the officers grabbed and slammed him against his doorway and to the ground. As the officers tried to gain control, Murphy heard the first gunshot of the afternoon.

Burns had reached for Nielson’s holstered gun and squeezed the trigger. The bullet missed everyone and hit the apartment’s back metal door. Murphy responded to the shot by holding his gun to Burns’ head. When Burns’ seemed to settle down, Murphy reholstered the gun but didn’t buckle it back in. Then, Burns again began twisting and breaking the officers’ grips. Unfazed by pepper spray, he was able to grab Murphy’s gun and fire one bullet, missing Murphy’s Kevlar vest and penetrating his back, just missing his spine.

“It wasn’t too painful, not incapacitating, just sharp in between my shoulder blades,” Murphy says. Almost immediately, Burns was Tasered and taken down by another officer who’d just arrived.

“There was a lot of shock about being shot by my own gun, as an officer. I never felt it leave my holster. I kept trying to come up with explanations,” says Murphy, who couldn’t sleep for a day or two after, continually replaying the scene in his mind, trying to make sense of it. Ultimately, he came to terms. “You can come out stronger for it. It’s not a reason to just cave in and quit.”

As an officer, Murphy says it was interesting experiencing the victim’s process.

“I never felt like I was dying; I was going to fight through it. Afterward, I was more concerned about what my co-workers went through, seeing it happen,” Murphy says. He had a speedy recovery, taking only one week off work, then on light duty for several weeks—because of a sprained ankle during the arrest, not because of the gun wound. Murphy received a purple heart for being shot in the line of duty, and Burns was sentenced to 15 years in prison. “I absolutely do not harbor ill feelings; that’s not my nature to think like that. It ruined his life—thankfully not mine.” (AD)

“I Carry Her With Me”: Carolyn Tuft
Carolyn Tuft had planned a girls’ night out to buy Valentine’s cards and have dinner with her two daughters, Kirsten and Kait.

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Kait was called in to work, so Carolyn and Kirsten headed to Trolley Square. The cheery pink card store seemed inviting. Kirsten giggled at funny gum packages. She chose two, holding them in her hand. Tuft heard shots and thought gang members might be outside the mall. Like mirrors, Cabin Fever’s glass walls reflected the inside of the store, so Tuft didn’t see Sulejman Talovic look at her before he shot through the glass. “I saw a bright flash of light. The glass hit me.” Talovic entered the store and shot off the back of Tuft’s right arm. Shotgun pellets hit her lung. He shot Kirsten, then left the store to reload. Returning, he put the gun against Tuft’s back, shooting away part of her hip. He shot Kirsten in the head. Tuft pulled herself close to her daughter and told her she loved her. Then Kirsten drew her last breath. Facedown on the card store floor, choking on her own blood, Tuft phoned a friend. “I’m dying,” she said. “Can you tell my kids I love them? Can you pick up Kait from work?”

The surgeon who operated on Tuft said, “I don’t know why she’s alive; she’s a fighter.” Tuft feels she lived through life-threatening injuries because her other children still needed her. She describes her former self as adventurous and playful, someone who hiked daily and rode her bike. “Now, my brain wants to run, but my body won’t cooperate. I always hurt. Parts of my body are gone, and they won’t be back. If there is anger, it’s that he took away my body so that I can’t take care of it the way I want to.” Her arm feels like a pin cushion full of needles. Pellets in her body cause lead poisoning. Then there’s the pain of loss. “That tightness in your throat when you are about to cry; it’s like it’s stuck there. Kirsten is always in the back of my head. I carry her with me.” Tuft and her other children rode bikes in Italy, as Kirsten had planned to before she was killed. “I’m here to create memories that keep Kirsten’s memory alive,” says Tuft. ”I want my life to be full of good things, so I have to make them happen.” (CC)