Tennessee: A gunman opened fire at a church youth performance on Sunday, injuring eight people and killing a man who witnesses called a hero for shielding others from a shotgun blast.
Members of the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church said they dove under pews or ran from the building when the shooting started. The gunman was tackled by congregants and eventually taken into police custody.
None of the children were injured. A hospital spokeswoman said five of the wounded were in critical condition and one person was in serious condition. Two others were treated and released.
Jim D Adkisson, 58, was charged with first-degree murder and was being held on $1 million bail, according to city spokesman Randy Kenner, who did not know if the suspect had retained an attorney.
Authorities were searching Adkisson's home in the Knoxville bedroom community of Powell, Kenner said.
The man slain was identified as Greg McKendry, 60, a longtime church member and usher. Church member Barbara Kemper told The Associated Press that McKendry ''stood in the front of the gunman and took the blast to protect the rest of us.''
The gunman's motive is not yet known. The church, like many other Unitarian Universalist churches, promotes progressive social work, such as desegregation and fighting for the rights of women and gays.
The Knoxville congregation has provided sanctuary for political refugees, fed the homeless and founded a chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, according to its Web site.
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Kemper said the gunman shouted before he opened fire.
''It was hateful words. He was saying hateful things,'' she said, but refused to elaborate.
The FBI was assisting in the case, Police Chief Sterling Owen said, in case it was a hate crime.
There were about 200 people watching the performance by 25 children when the shooting took place.
Church member Mark Harmon was in the first row. ''It had barely begun when there was an incredibly loud bang,'' he said.
Harmon said he thought the noise was part of the play, then he heard a second loud bang. As he dove for cover, he realized a woman behind him was bleeding. She looked like she was in shock, touching her wound, he said.
''It seems so unreal,'' Harmon said. ''You're sitting in church, you're watching a children's performance of a play and suddenly you hear a bang.''
Harmon said church members just behind him in the second and third rows were shot. He said his wife told him that she saw the gunman pull the shotgun out of a guitar case.
Witnesses reported hearing about three blasts from the 12-gauge shotgun, which spreads pellets out when the shot leaves the barrel. Witnesses said they did not recognize the gunman.
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