First, let me say Taco Bell is entirely uninvolved. They were the stage Jason Scott Williams used to close out his life. The police are blameless. They did their jobs as best as they could.
Megan Keleman
did nothing to deserve this.
In fact, some
small amount of tragedy must be draped around Jason, the killer.
Some blame belongs to the judges and DAs who kept allowing Williams to walk out of custody. They are the ones who need to be identified and charged with failing to protect the public. They should be made into an example.
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| This is the Taco Bell at Graham Road and Hudson Drive but not on August 14th 2024. Graham is not visible, but at the bottom while Hudson is to the right. You can see the cars backed up at the order speaker. Your order is picked up around the corner. The grayish green lawns seem flat. They are not. Thanks to Google Images |
Short recap from the Akron Beacon Journal.
Wednesday,
August 14th, 2024, Megan pulled into a Taco Bell at the corner of Graham Road
and Hudson Drive. Both Graham and Hudson
are main roads and are heavily trafficked. She was picking-up from the drive-thro.
A black SUV
driven by Williams struck the back of her car. Witnesses later told police Williams had honked
his horn as she pulled into the drive-thru.
The paper isn’t clear if Megan felt in danger before being
rear-ended. She was on the phone with
her dad. I suspect cars were in front of
her, preventing her from driving away.
The pickup lane is at the bottom of two steep grass slopes, requiring a
hard left turn from the ordering window to the pickup window. Most of us have been in these slots
ourselves. You also know that to use the
speaker, you need to pull up so close that you have no room to open the car
door should you need to abandon the vehicle.
Megan's dad
advises her to dial 911 for police.
Neither Megan nor her dad know she has seconds to live.
Before she could
call for help, the black SUV struck Megan’s car a second time. Dad starts screaming to call the police. The Taco Bell employee taking the order hears
him and makes the call. The police have
no time to respond.
Williams gets
out of his car, shoots Megan, and (pardon my editorial comments) does what he
should have done years ago, kills himself. The police arrive shortly; it is 7:30 local
time on a bright early summer evening.
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| This is the entrance to the drive-thro lane. Once Megan enters the lane, it appears she had only one way out. |
I don’t know if there were cars that prevented Megan from driving away. I measured the curb at the entrance to the parking lot. It is 6 inches tall. The pickup lane's curb is shorter, maybe 4 inches tall. You could drive over that. The steep hill bordering Graham Road and Hudson Drive could be too steep to drive over. An acceleration sufficient to climb the slopes, I suspect, would jet you into traffic. A trained and motivated person with the right vehicle could have driven onto the slope and then sideways parallel to Hudson Drive. I doubt a 25-year-old would have the wherewithal to accomplish this.
Williams had a
troubled 53 years of life. When he was
22 (1994), Williams drunkenly drove his car into a ditch in Aurora, OH. Police found him drunk with a .44 caliber
revolver. He was charged with DUI and
indicted for carrying a concealed weapon.
Several months later, Stow, OH, police picked him up driving under
suspension.
This is the
first screw-up. Despite having access to
police records, the DA cut him a deal and dropped the felony. Williams paid some fines and moved his
problems to Georgia. The ABJ was able to
determine in 1996, he was charged with public drunkenness in George.
Things were
quiet. Williams later returned to Ohio,
and his drinking problem resurfaced in 2023.
He drunkenly crashed his motorcycle in Aurora, OH. Here, too, a deal was struck. Williams avoided a drunk driving charge and
pleaded to losing control of a motorized vehicle.
Williams starts circling
the drain. In January 2024, he called Glenbeigh
Hospital's helpline, saying he wanted to kill himself. Glenbeigh Hospital is an addiction treatment
facility. The police took him into
custody.
Unfortunately,
there were no local facilities that could take him in. He was at that time taking "an unspecified
psychiatric medication." He was
released to his wife. Once again, the
public records go blank. That is until March
2024, when he was stopped and found to be under the influence of alcohol and carrying
a Glock handgun.
On a $5000 bond,
the judge let Williams go with the provision that he only drives to work and
cannot have a firearm. The police keep
the Glock.
Shortly
afterwards, Williams and his wife sell their Aurora condo (Maybe to pay his attorney?), and Williams moves to an apartment.
IN MY OPINION,
Williams was drunk on August 14th and looking for a way to kill himself and
found it by killing Megan. Faced with an
act he couldn’t come back from: Williams found the solution he had been chasing
for years and killed himself.
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| This is the turn to the pick-up window. The slope levels off a bit, but the path remains partially blocked by a light post, bushes and a advertising sign. Seeing a man with a gun approach your car, would you have seen the path out? |
What are the tactical messages here?
1: The police
can't and will not be able to arrive in time to save you. God knows they want to, but that's not reality.
2: Stop placing
yourself in areas that limit your mobility.
This may be an elevator in circumstances that make you uncomfortable, or
enclosed spaces you want to traverse. If
you must, move through them quickly.
2A: This isn’t always controllable. An accident could suddenly lock up the
expressway. A broken door could force
everyone to use one specific entrance.
Rooms suddenly become crowded. Stay
alert. Keep your wits about you and look
for alternatives, then act on them.
3: Be prepared to fight. Have tools on you. Maintain your tools and skill levels.
4: Let’s rethink
how we want to teach what is acceptable damage when you think your life is in
danger. Was Megan worried that she would
be in trouble for leaving her order behind if she pulled through an empty
pickup lane? Did she worry that driving
sideways on the grass slope would damage her car or get her in trouble?
4A: If you think
you're in danger, act; don't look for consensus.
5: The system
doesn't care for you. Individuals that
comprise the system will have goals that aren’t compatible with yours. Williams was given workarounds too many times
because it fit someone's goals.
6: Daylight
hours should not be considered a safety net.
Lastly, would
having a handgun have saved Megan's life?
I don’t think so. Let’s reframe
the question.
Would having a
handgun and a mindset enabled by training have saved Megan's life. I believe it would.
5 Sept 24 addendum
Williams' wife has recently commented and added additional facts to this tragedy.
Following his threatened suicide in January, she hid all his guns in a secret location. She doesn't know where he got .40 calibre used in the killings. At that time he checked into the Indiana Center for Recovery for about a month.
While he struggled to stay sober, the wife indicated he seemed drunk for the four days prior to the killing.
Williams' wife and son report he had a history of 'spazzing out' when stuck in the bain of modern life, stopped traffic. Other witnesses claim the drive-thro line was packed and backed up.
One woman in the line was busy watching videos on her phone and when she heard shots had no idea what was going on. A second woman, fearing for her life, backed into the car behind her, further complicating any exit from the area.
It also appears that Williams' initial attempt to shoot himself failed and preformed a clearance drill. The police found one live round on the ground among four empty cases.
Tactical insight?
Well, clearly paying attention to your surrounds could give you a survival edge. You saw what was about to happen and reacted.
Always think about an escape route in all your surroundings. Change these routes as conditions change.
Williams' gun appears to have jammed. We don't know how long he stared at it before he got it back in order. Be prepared to take advantage of these lulls.
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