The wife of a Philadelphia pastor saved his and their child’s life on Thursday by shooting an armed robber.
Stephanie Cook, her husband Pastor Robert Cook, and their 12-year-old son were leaving a concert in North Philadelphia when a man armed with what appeared to be shotgun approached them and tried to rob the pastor. During the struggle, the robber hit the pastor in the head with the butt of the gun.
"And I turned like I was going to get my wallet, but I was stalling," Pastor Cook told WPVI. "And he hit me in the head with the gun. He swung it like a baseball bat. This is the first time I actually thought I’d die."
Stephanie Cook said she thought the man might kill her family after he hit her husband.
"I was afraid he was going to kill my husband and son," she told the Philadelphia Inquirer.
That is when she pulled out her own gun, which she was licensed to carry.
"And everything was like lightning for a minute. And then I heard my wife saying, drop the gun, drop the gun. I’m like she’s got her gun. He turns towards her, and I said, ‘Shoot him! Shoot him!’ And she shot him," Pastor Cook described to WPVI.
After the robber refused to drop his weapon, Stephanie Cook shot him once in the leg with her .22 pistol.
"And at that time, I raised my gun and aimed it and told the man, ‘Drop your gun! Drop your gun,’" Stephanie Cook explained to WTXF. "And since he didn’t drop the gun, I knew there was still a threat to them and to myself, and that’s when I pulled the trigger."
"I didn’t want the man to die. I just wanted him to leave my family alone," she said.
After the robber was hit in the leg, he dropped his weapon, which turned out to be a nail gun that was modified to look like a firearm, and ran away while yelling that he had been the one who was robbed. The man then jumped on a moving car as it drove down the road.
"The suspect was able to make an unusual escape by jumping on running boards of a moving vehicle that happened to be traveling east," Philadelphia Police Chief Inspector Scott Small told WPVI.
But his escape did not last long, and police arrested him a few blocks away. None of the Cooks were seriously injured during the ordeal.
"We both have concealed carry permits because we live in a crazy world and people put shotguns in your face," the pastor told the Inquirer. He said that he still hopes the robber comes to Jesus, although behind bars.
"It would be nice if he found Jesus," Robert Cook told the paper. "But I think he belongs in jail and he can find Jesus there."