Luby's shooting#Perpetrator

On October 16, 1991, 35-year-old George Hennard, an unemployed former Merchant Marine seaman, drove a blue 1987 Ford Ranger pickup truck through the plate-glass front window of a Luby's Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas, at 12:39 p.m. October 16 was Boss's Day, and the cafeteria was unusually crowded with around 150 people.{{cite news |last1=Hart |first1=Lianne |last2=Wood |first2=Tracy |date=October 17, 1991 |title=23 Shot Dead at Texas Cafeteria |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-10-17-mn-740-story.html |newspaper=Los Angeles Times |page=1 }}{{cite news |last=Hayes |first=Thomas C. |date=October 17, 1991 |title=Gunman Kills 22 and Himself in Texas Cafeteria |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1991/10/17/us/gunman-kills-22-and-himself-in-texas-cafeteria.html?pagewanted=all |newspaper=The New York Times |access-date=August 15, 2007 }} Hennard then began firing from inside the truck while holding Glock 17 and Ruger P89 pistols;{{Cite news|last=Terry|first=Don|date=1991-10-18|title=Portrait of Texas Killer: Impatient and Troubled|language=en-US|work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1991/10/18/us/portrait-of-texas-killer-impatient-and-troubled.html|access-date=2021-06-03|issn=0362-4331}}{{cite journal|last=Chin|first=Paula|date=November 4, 1991|title=A Texas Massacre|url=https://people.com/archive/a-texas-massacre-vol-36-no-17/|journal=People|volume=36|issue=17|access-date=January 13, 2012}} the first victim was veterinarian Michael Griffith.{{cite news |last=Spellman |first=Jim |date=November 9, 2009 |title=Fort Hood attack stirs painful memories for '91 massacre survivor |url=http://edition.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/11/08/texas.lubys.shooting.survivor/ |publisher=CNN |access-date=June 23, 2015 |archive-date=June 28, 2013 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130628222651/http://edition.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/11/08/texas.lubys.shooting.survivor/ |url-status=dead }} Hennard exited the truck and yelled, "All women of Killeen and Belton are vipers! This is what you've done to me and my family! This is what Bell County did to me ... this is payback day!"{{Cite web|title=The Luby's Cafeteria Massacre of 1991 Crime Magazine|url=http://crimemagazine.com/lubys-cafeteria-massacre-1991|access-date=2021-06-03|website=crimemagazine.com}}{{Cite news|title=A Texas Massacre|url=https://people.com/archive/a-texas-massacre-vol-36-no-17/|access-date=2021-06-03|newspaper=People|language=en}} He then opened fire on the patrons and staff with both pistols. Hennard then circled around the cafeteria, selectively picking his victims. Hennard said "You bitch" to a woman before fatally shooting her.

Hennard saw another woman hiding underneath a bench near the serving line and said, "Hiding from me, bitch?" before shooting her dead. Hennard then approached Steve Ernst, who was hiding underneath a table, before shooting him. Ernst then rolled over, holding his stomach. The shooter then approached a woman with a crying baby. He barked at the woman, saying, "You with the baby. Get out before I change my mind." The woman ran out, holding the baby in her arms. After the woman left, Hennard shot Ernst's wife in the arm. The bullet passed through and killed 70-year-old Venice Ellen Henehan, Ernst's mother-in-law.

During a brief lull in the shooting, Hennard approached the table of 28-year-old Tommy Vaughan in the rear of the cafeteria. Huddled on the floor beside a window, Vaughan threw himself through the window, creating an escape route for others. Dozens of people pushed, shoved, and knocked each other down as they made their escape. By the time police arrived a few minutes later, a third of the victims had managed to escape.{{cite magazine |last=Woodbury |first=Richard |date=October 28, 1991 |title=Crime: Ten Minutes in Hell |url=http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,974133,00.html |magazine=Time |access-date=June 24, 2015 |url-access=subscription}}{{cite book|last1=Dawson|first1=Carol|title=House of Plenty: The Rise, Fall, and Revival of Luby's Cafeterias|date=1 January 2010|publisher=University of Texas Press|location=Austin, TX|isbn=978-0-292-78234-1|pages=176–177|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zRezrZ1YZ84C&pg=PA171}}

Hennard reloaded at least three times before police arrived and engaged in a brief shootout. Wounded, he retreated to an area between the two bathrooms (people were hiding in these bathrooms and had blocked their doors). Police repeatedly ordered Hennard to surrender, but he refused, saying, "No, I'm going to kill more people."{{cite web |url = https://kdhnews.com/news/local/25-years-later-memories-of-lubys-shooting-fade-but-dont-die/article_c9b9b2b0-9357-11e6-ad69-abfb3fb48883.html|title = 25 Years Later: Memories of Luby's shooting fade but don't die |last = Blankenship |first = Kyle |date = October 15, 2016 |website = Killeen Daily Herald |access-date = January 24, 2023}} Hennard was shot twice more by police, in the abdomen. Having depleted ammunition for one of his weapons and his injuries growing more severe, he committed suicide by shooting himself in the head with the final bullet. He had shot and killed 23 people—10 of them with single shots to the head at point blank range—and wounded another 27.{{cite book| first1=Michael H. |last1=Stone |first2=Gary |last2=Brucato |title=The New Evil: Understanding the Emergence of Modern Violent Crime |location=Amherst, New York |publisher=Prometheus |year=2019|pages=44–45}}

He discharged his weapons about 80 times during the shooting, and police discharged their weapons about 30 times.{{Cite web |last=writer |first=Lauren Dodd {{!}} Herald staff |date=2021-10-17 |title=30 years later: Mass shooting trend lasts long after Luby's massacre |url=https://kdhnews.com/news/local/30-years-later-mass-shooting-trend-lasts-long-after-luby-s-massacre/article_26eb5c54-2ea3-11ec-9c3b-7fb53c36b2a3.html |access-date=2024-10-13 |website=The Killeen Daily Herald |language=en}}{{Cite web |title=Books closed on Luby's cafeteria massacre - UPI Archives |url=https://www.upi.com/Archives/1991/12/19/Books-closed-on-Lubys-cafeteria-massacre/4761693118800/ |access-date=2024-10-13 |website=UPI |language=en}} Only the assailant was struck by police gunfire.{{Cite web |last=Clark |first=John |date=2001-10-16 |title=Gunpowder smell filled |url=https://www.tdtnews.com/archive/article_462c4011-c952-5958-8f2a-1f1dcef0d135.html |access-date=2024-10-13 |website=Temple Daily Telegram |language=en}}

Victims of the shootings were:{{cite web|url=https://apnews.com/178201fa52edf751489ca0bdf15ca772|title=Victims of the Texas Cafeteria Massacre With AM-Cafeteria Massacre|website=Associated Press|date=October 19, 1991|access-date=March 20, 2020}}

George Pierre Hennard (October 15, 1956 - October 16, 1991) was born on in Sayre, Pennsylvania, into a wealthy family. Hennard was the son of a Swiss-born surgeon and a homemaker.{{cite book|last1=Dawson|first1=Carol|title=House of Plenty: The Rise, Fall, and Revival of Luby's Cafeterias|date=1 January 2010|publisher=University of Texas Press|location=Austin, TX|isbn=978-0-292-78234-1|page=171|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zRezrZ1YZ84C&pg=PA171}} He had two younger siblings, brother Alan and sister Desiree.{{Cite news|url=http://people.com/archive/a-texas-massacre-vol-36-no-17/|title=A Texas Massacre – Vol. 36 No. 17|date=1991-11-04|website=people.com|language=en-US|access-date=2016-11-04}} Since the age of 5, Hennard and his family moved across the country as his father worked at several army hospitals. Hennard's family later moved to New Mexico, where his father worked at the White Sands Missile Range near Las Cruces. After graduating from Mayfield High School in 1974, he enlisted in the U.S. Navy and served for three years, until he was honorably discharged.{{Cite news|url=http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/gossip/confidential/texas-massacre-eerie-link-movie-fisher-king-article-1.1946961|title=Texas massacre had eerie link to movie 'The Fisher King'|newspaper=NY Daily News|access-date=2016-11-04}} Hennard later worked as a merchant mariner, but was dismissed for drug use.{{cite news |last1=Kennedy |first1=J. Michael |last2=Serrano |first2=Richard A. |date=October 18, 1991 |title=Police May Never Learn What Motivated Gunman: Massacre: Hennard was seen as reclusive, belligerent. Officials are looking into possibility he hated women. |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-10-18-mn-455-story.html |newspaper=Los Angeles Times |page=1}} Several months later, Hennard enrolled in a drug treatment program in Houston.

Early in the investigation of the massacre, the Killeen police chief said that Hennard "had an evident problem with women for some reason". After his parents divorced in 1983, his father moved to Houston, and his mother moved to Henderson, Nevada. The Glock 17 and Ruger P89 9mm pistols which Hennard used were purchased in February 1991 at Mike's Gun House, a gun shop in Henderson, Nevada.

Hennard had begun to work at several different jobs, including construction crews in South Dakota and Killeen, while living part-time in Nevada with his mother. In Texas, he lived in a redbrick colonial home in Belton that his family had purchased in 1980 shortly after moving to Fort Hood.

Hennard had stalked two women, sisters 23-year-old Jill Fritz and 19-year-old Jana Jemigan, who lived two blocks away from him in his neighborhood. He sent them a five-page letter in June, part of which read: "Please give me the satisfaction of someday laughing in the face of all those mostly white treacherous female vipers from those two towns [Killeen and Belton] who tried to destroy me and my family" and "You think the three of us can get together some day?" He also wrote that he was "truly flattered knowing I have two teenage groupie fans".{{cite news |last1=Kennedy |first1=J. Michael |last2=Serrano |first2=Richard A. |date=October 18, 1991 |title=Police May Never Learn What Motivated Gunman: Massacre: Hennard was seen as reclusive, belligerent. Officials are looking into possibility he hated women. |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-10-18-mn-455-story.html |newspaper=Los Angeles Times |page=2}}

Hennard was described as reclusive and belligerent, with an explosive temper. He was discharged from the Merchant Marine on May 11, 1989 for possession of marijuana and racial incidents. That same month, Hennard's seaman papers were suspended after he had a racial argument with another shipmate. Numerous reports included accounts of Hennard's expressed hatred of women. An ex-roommate of his said, "He hated blacks and Hispanics. He said women were snakes and always had derogatory remarks about them, especially after fights with his mother." Survivors of the shootings later said Hennard had passed over men to shoot women. Fifteen of the 23 murder victims (65%) were women, as were many of the wounded. He called two of the victims a "bitch" before shooting them.

In 1990, Hennard called Isaiah (Ike) R. Williams, a port agent for the national maritime union in Wilmington, California, stating that he needed a letter of recommendation to regain his papers and rejoin the Merchant Marine. "I don't recall having given him one," Williams claimed. Hennard had learned in mid-February that his attempt to be reinstated had been denied.{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1991/10/18/us/portrait-of-texas-killer-impatient-and-troubled.html|title=Portrait of Texas Killer: Impatient and Troubled|first=Don|last=Terry|newspaper=The New York Times|date=October 18, 1991}} Several months later, he entered a drug-treatment program in Houston.

Around two months before the shooting, Hennard entered a convenience store in Belton to buy breakfast. Mary Mead, the clerk of the store, claimed that Hennard had leaned over the counter and said, "I want you to tell everybody, if they don't quit messing around my house, something awful is going to happen."

A week and a half before the shooting, Hennard collected his paycheck at a concrete company in Copperas Cove and announced he was quitting. Hennard also wondered aloud what would happen if he killed someone. "He got to talking about some of the people in Belton and certain women that had given him problems," coworker Bubba Hawkins claimed. "And he kept saying, 'Watch and see, watch and see'."

On his 35th birthday, October 15, 1991, Hennard spoke with his mother on the phone. Later that evening, while eating a cheeseburger and french fries outside of Belton, Hennard had a sudden outburst of rage as he watched television coverage of Clarence Thomas's confirmation hearings. "When an interview with Anita Hill came on, he just went off," manager Bill Stringer said. "He started screaming, 'You bitch! You bastards opened the door for all the women!{{'"}}

{{See also|Gun laws in Texas}}

File:Lubys memorial killeen.jpg

An anticrime bill was scheduled for a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives the day after the massacre. Some of the Hennard victims had been constituents of Rep. Chet Edwards, and in response, he abandoned his opposition to a gun control provision that was part of the bill.{{cite news |last=Douglas |first=Carlyle C. |date=October 20, 1991 |title=Dead: 23 Texans and 1 Anti-Gun Measure |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE0D91031F933A15753C1A967958260 |newspaper=The New York Times|access-date=March 28, 2008 }}{{cite book |last=Kopel |first=David B. |author-link=Dave Kopel |year=2012 |chapter=Killeen, Texas, Massacre |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QeGJH48PT0kC&pg=PT648|editor-last=Carter |editor-first=Gregg Lee|title=Guns in American Society |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QeGJH48PT0kC |volume=2 |edition=2nd |publisher=ABC-CLIO |location=Santa Barbara, California|pages=648–650|isbn=978-0-313-38671-8}} The provision, which did not pass, would have banned some weapons and magazines like one used by Hennard.

Families of deceased victims, survivors, and policemen received counseling for grief, shock, and stress.

The Texas State Rifle Association and others preferred that the state allow its citizens to carry concealed weapons. Democratic Governor Ann Richards vetoed such bills, but in 1995, her Republican successor, George W. Bush, signed one into force.{{cite news |last=Duggan |first=Paul |date=March 16, 2000 |title=Gun-Friendly Governor |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2000/03/16/gun-friendly-governor/1e9fb965-17ea-4abf-a87f-6e9c51b81902/ |newspaper=Washington Post|access-date=June 22, 2015 }} The law had been campaigned for by Suzanna Hupp, who was present at the massacre; both of her parents, Alphonse "Al" Gratia and Ursula "Suzy" Gratia, were killed by Hennard.{{Cite web|url=https://www.texasarchive.org/library/index.php?title=2013_02220|title=The Luby's Massacre – Interview with Suzanna Gratia Hupp (1992)|last=Ruddy|first=Jim|date=1992|website=Texas Archive of the Moving Image|access-date=2018-10-25}} She later testified that she would have liked to have had her .38 revolver, but said, "It was a hundred feet away in my car." (She had feared that if she was caught carrying it she might lose her chiropractor's license.) Hupp testified across the country in support of concealed handgun laws, and was elected to the Texas House of Representatives in 1996.{{cite web |author= |date=June 19, 2006 |title=National Advisory Committee on Violence Against Women, Biographical Information |url=https://www.justice.gov/archive/ovw/docs/nac_web_bios.pdf |publisher=justice.gov |page=5 |access-date=February 17, 2011 }}

A pink granite memorial stands behind the Killeen Community Center with the date of the event and the names of those killed.

The restaurant reopened five months after the massacre, but closed permanently on September 9, 2000.{{Cite web|url=http://archives.cnn.com/2000/US/09/11/lubys.massacre.ap/|title=Luby's in Killeen, Texas, site of 1991 massacre, closes its doors|agency=Associated Press|date=September 11, 2000|work=CNN|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070423095856/http://archives.cnn.com/2000/US/09/11/lubys.massacre.ap/|archive-date=April 23, 2007|access-date=July 15, 2017}} In 2006, a buffet called "Yank Sing" occupied the former Luby's.{{cite news |last=Nathan |first=Robert |date=October 15, 2006 |title=Luby's tragedy: 15 years later |url=http://kdhnews.com/news/luby-s-tragedy-years-later/article_403bf9be-b235-590e-80c5-3039c908264e.html |url-access=subscription |work=Killeen Daily Herald }} The restaurant remains open as of April 2025.

{{Portal|Texas|1990s}}

• Gun violence in the United States
• Mass shootings in the United States
• 2009 Fort Hood shooting and 2014 Fort Hood shootings, two other mass shootings in Killeen, Texas
• San Ysidro McDonald's massacre, the deadliest mass shooting in the United States prior to the Luby's shooting{{cite news |last1=Kennedy |first1=J. Michael |last2=Serrano |first2=Richard A. |date=October 18, 1991 |title=Police May Never Learn What Motivated Gunman: Massacre: Hennard was seen as reclusive, belligerent. Officials are looking into possibility he hated women. |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-10-18-mn-455-story.html |newspaper=Los Angeles Times |page=3}} by James Huberty.
• École Polytechnique massacre, another mass shooting targeting women
• List of shootings in Texas

{{Reflist}}

• {{cite news|date=August 11, 2001 |title=Shooting rampage at Killeen Luby's left 24 dead |url=http://www.chron.com/life/article/Shooting-rampage-at-Killeen-Luby-s-left-24-dead-2037092.php |newspaper=Houston Chronicle|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111201005126/http://www.chron.com/life/article/Shooting-rampage-at-Killeen-Luby-s-left-24-dead-2037092.php |archive-date=December 1, 2011 |url-status=dead}}
• {{cite news |last=Winingham |first=Ralph |year=1997 |title=Texas massacre, fear of crime spur concealed-gun laws |url=http://www.chron.com/content/chronicle/nation/guns/part2/gunside1.html |newspaper=San Antonio Express-News|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/19990128141416/http://www.chron.com/content/chronicle/nation/guns/part2/gunside1.html |archive-date=January 28, 1999 }}

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