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Army Gives Update on Shooting at Fort Stewart. Soldiers Tackled and Subdued Fort Stewart Shooting Suspect; All 5 Soldiers Who Were Shot Are in Stable Condition. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired August 06, 2025 - 15:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[15:30:00]

LT. COL. ANGEL TOMKO, SPOKESPERSON, ARMY 3RD INFANTRY DIVISION: ... the questions, given that this is an ongoing investigation and we may not have all the information that we can share but we will try to be as transparent as possible.

We will not release the name of any victims until the next of kin notification has been complete. We will not speculate as to any intentions, motives, or backstories given that this is an ongoing investigation.

When you ask your questions we ask that you please give your name and the affiliation in case we need to do a follow-up. And it's a little hard to hear so please speak up so that General Lubas can hear you and that you can hear him. Thank you ladies and gentlemen, I will now turn it over to General Lubas.

BRIG. GEN. JOHN LUBAS, COMMANDER, FORT STEWART-HUNTER ARMY AIRFIELD: Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen and thank you for joining us. This morning shortly before 11 o'clock an active duty soldier assigned to Fort Stewart, Georgia shot and wounded five of his fellow soldiers here on Fort Stewart. Thankfully all are in stable condition and all are expected to recover.

The alleged shooter is in custody. We have re-established security. I have lifted all lockdown measures on Fort Stewart and there is currently no threat to local community.

I'd like to recognize and thank our Army law enforcement and medical personnel and our partners from local, state and federal law enforcement and emergency services for their quick response and support. I would also like to thank the brave soldiers who immediately intervened and subdued the shooter. These soldiers without a doubt prevented further casualties.

Our wounded soldiers were initially evacuated to Wynn Army Community Hospital right here on Fort Stewart. All arrived in stable condition and three of the five required surgical intervention. Two have been transported to Memorial Hospital in Savannah, Georgia for additional care.

We have identified the alleged shooter as Sergeant Quornelius Radford, an automated logistics sergeant assigned to 2nd Brigade Combat Team. Sergeant Radford has not previously deployed to combat. Sergeant Radford has been interviewed by the Army Criminal Investigation Division and is currently in pre-trial confinement awaiting a charging decision by the Office of the Special Trial Counsel.

Right now our primary focus is first on caring for our injured soldiers and their families and also supporting the soldiers of the Spartan Brigade. All of the families of the victims have been notified and we're wrapping our arms around them and ensuring we provide them all the support that we can.

Before I take questions, I want to remind you that this is an ongoing investigation and we're still gathering questions.

Ladies and gentlemen, I'll now take your questions.

[Speaker 10] General Lubas, can you give us what unit he was assigned to and how long he served in the Army? You didn't mention it.

LUBAS: Yes, he is assigned to one of our sustainment units here in 2nd Brigade Combat Team at Fort Stewart and I will have to confirm how long he served with us.

Yes, sir.

RUSS BYNUM, ASSOCIATED PRESS: Russ Bynum with the associated press. As best you can, knowing it's still early, can you walk us through where this happened, what happened in the shooting and were the victims subordinates of the sergeants or were they people over him in rank?

LUBAS: Yes, right now it's premature and we're gathering a lot of the information. What we know is this soldier, the shooting occurred at the soldier's place of work. It did involve his co-workers.

We're still not certain about the motivations, but again, he's been interviewed by Army investigators and we believe we'll gain more information here shortly.

Yes, ma'am.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you know if this was any kind of training exercise, or were they cleaning any weapons, anything that you know so far?

LUBAS: No, ma'am. We don't have any reason to believe it had anything to do with it with a training event. Other than that, I can't state the motivations for this soldier.

Yes, sir.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've heard that the shooter may have been from Jacksonville, Florida. Are you able to confirm that? We also heard that he had maybe been arrested for a DUI recently.

LUBAS: Yes, at this point, I can't confirm where he's from. We can follow up on that. I do believe he was arrested locally for a DUI that was unknown to his chain of command until the event occurred and we started looking into the law enforcement databases.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE), Can you tell us whether or not that was a military weapon or whether this was a personal weapon?

LUBAS: Yes, ma'am. I can confirm it was not a military weapon and we believe it was a personal handgun.

Yes, sir.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What does this mean for ongoing security measures? That this situation will occur or (INAUDIBLE)?

LUBAS: Yes, I'm very confident in the security of this installation.

[15:35:00]

We've got a great partnership with local law enforcement. As you can see here at our gates, we have armed guards in protective equipment. This one's a bit difficult and we're going to have to determine how he was able to get a handgun to his place of duty.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE). Has the suspect had any prior disciplinary or behavioral issues on base?

LUBAS: No, ma'am. Not that we're aware of, but again, it's early in the investigation, but not that I'm currently aware of.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: WJCL 22 news. You mentioned that some soldiers helped to do this. Do you know if this arrest is surrender peacefully or was his arrest (INAUDIBLE).

LUBAS: I don't have the details on that, but I know that his soldiers in the area that witnessed the shooting immediately and without hesitation tackled the soldier, subdued him, that allowed law enforcement to then take him into custody.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And we've got time for one more question.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I know that you can't speak to the motivation, but you know, if this turned out to be some situation where somebody had extremist beliefs or maybe classified as a terrorist attack, I mean, how does that change the basis for response and the basis of investigation?

LUBAS: Yes, currently we have no reason to believe any of that is the case. However, we continually -- continuously assess the threat environment, both in the immediate area and across our Army and DoD installations, and we will address the threat level accordingly.

Yes, sir.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you have the rank of the shooter?

LUBAS: He was a sergeant. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your questions. And again, thanks to the local responders and the local community for their help. Thanks and have a great afternoon.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you, sir.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: All right. So let's start with the good news and all of that, because as we've known that five soldiers have been shot in this at Fort Stewart, Georgia, he said all of them are in stable condition, all expected to recover. And we certainly had concerns because two of them had been transported from the local hospital there to get more serious care from the level one trauma center in Savannah, Georgia.

So that is very good news.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: Certainly. We've also learned the identity of the suspected shooter, Quornelius Radford, Sergeant Quornelius Radford, someone who had not been previously deployed to a combat situation. We understand that he is currently in pretrial confinement and that he has been interviewed by Army investigators.

Some notable moments and details shared there by Brigadier General John Lubas. He noted that the weapon that was used was not a military weapon. This was a personal handgun.

And also to the question -- though he did not speculate on a potential motive -- also to the question of whether that brush with law enforcement that we learned about from John Miller and his sources had anything to do with this. Apparently, the military was unaware. This was unknown that DUI arrest to his chain of command. He had no apparent disciplinary issues that the general was aware of as of this early stage in the investigation.

Let's go to CNN's John Miller, who has been listening alongside us. Some really pertinent details there just shared by the general, John.

JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: As you point out, it tells us that it wasn't any kind of exercise where there were multiple people with weapons or in training or firing weapons, that this was not a military weapon, likely a personal weapon. As most of us know, in general, the military does not allow soldiers to carry personal weapons on base. There are cases where they are allowed to have them and store them under lock and key for things like going hunting or something, but but not to carry weapons on base.

And he did confirm that arrest in May based on a traffic violation that then turned into an actual arrest for driving under the influence. That case still pending.

So, you know, what we see here is an individual who may have been under certain stressors just related to that arrest, which was not on base, was outside.

He did point out, General Lubas, that interestingly, this was not known to the chain of command. So the local law enforcement people did not report to the army that they had arrested a soldier. But this is something they learned after that. What does that tell us? It tells us that whatever brokered the emotional state that caused him to open fire on his fellow service members on that base likely had nothing to do with that additional incident that we learned of earlier today. So a lot of questions to be answered.

What was going on between him and his fellow soldiers? What was the issue here? The general not shedding much light on that as he illuminated us about other things.

KEILAR: Yes, maybe it's a data point of a troubled individual and maybe that's what it tells us.

[15:40:00]

Josh Campbell let's bring you in to talk a little bit about this. Let's just also talk about the picture that General Lubas is painting here, which is this is they say went after his co-workers, but he said those soldiers sort of jumped into action and subdued the suspect. So many times when we see these shootings on these military installations, quite frankly, they often end in suicide or being shot by security. That is not what happened here.

We're learning perhaps why, because these co-workers of his jumped on him and subdued him.

Let's talk a little bit, if we could, and maybe you can shed some light on this, on what he was doing exactly. Automated logistics -- I don't think a lot of people are going to know what that means exactly. Talk to us a little bit about what this unit was doing.

JOSH CAMPBELL, CNN SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, so General Lubas described him as an automated logistics sergeant. So when you hear that, that's essentially a warehouse operations and dealing with supplies and things like that. I mean, the U.S. military, including obviously the U.S. Army, is this behemoth organization. And so they do nothing without their logisticians and logistics. And so it appears, at least from the general there, that was what his job was here.

One thing, you know, you mentioned the general saying that he was subdued by his co-workers. When I heard that, obviously that's so chilling that, you know, trying to understand, well, how many people may he have been able to target, but for those brave soldiers then going after him and actually bringing him, you know, into some type of restraint.

And the big question that we still have, which obviously investigators are still trying to get at, are the five victims people that he knew and people that he was specifically targeting? Or is this someone who just came to his place of work and was an intent on causing indiscriminate loss of life? Again, that is a major question.

We do know that the five who were injured, we expect at least four of them right now, I believe at last take in stable condition, potentially they could be interviewed to try to determine, is this someone who had some type of series of grievances? Did they have some type of conflict with their fellow soldiers as well?

Again, to try to just understand why this person was doing this and was this actually targeted towards specific people?

And then the final point I'll note is that we've seen so many times in these incidents that active shooters have what they call the pathway to violence, where people are exhibiting warning signs, what they describe as leakage in the field of FBI profiling. And so the question will be, did any of the people that were in his orbit know that he was experiencing potential stressors?

And so that is something that the military will want to understand as well. But I can tell you based on being in the military that personnel are continually trained on how to spot and detect when their co- workers might be suffering from things. Again, that early warning system.

They don't want potential stressors and issues to actually build into some type of violence. And so that would be something that they certainly look at here, even beyond this one incident. Are there lessons learned that we can then try to push out to the workforce to ensure that something like this doesn't happen again, or at least reinforce what we've already trained them?

SANCHEZ: Let's go to a retired General Ty Seidule. General, I wonder what you make of these details that we're learning specifically that this incident involved the suspected gunman's co-workers and that also the brave actions of fellow soldiers prevented further bloodshed.

BRIG. GEN. TY SEIDULE, U.S. ARMY (RET.): That's exactly what I was thinking, which is all of the co-workers that were there. You had five people shot. This is enormously a terrible incident.

And yet immediately we had our soldiers do what they should do, which is fight back and fight back quickly to ensure that there was no loss of life. And what's going to come from that, I think, is the Soldier's Medal. And for soldiers who see that, the Soldier's Medal is given for heroism outside of combat operations.

And so for somebody that saves a drowning victim or saves someone in a burning car, or in this case, the people that subdued somebody with a handgun so that no one else would get hurt. So I'm thinking about that first.

The other thing I'm thinking is we were talking earlier about maybe the influence of the DUI, and we were speculating on this, and maybe you think about the old Army aphorism, which is the first report is always wrong.

So we always know that once we get here more involved, once we hear more from the --

SANCHEZ: Looks like we're having a technical issue there with the General.

But if we could pick up where he left off with Chief Charles Ramsey. Chief Ramsey, the question of whether this had anything to do with that DUI arrest from earlier in May was somewhat answered by General Lubas there saying that the military chain of command had no idea that this had happened.

[15:45:00]

Are you familiar with the protocols here? Why perhaps they weren't notified by local law enforcement that the suspected gunman had been arrested not that long ago?

CHARLES RAMSEY, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, I can tell you from the departments that I worked in, if we arrested a member of the military for anything, we would notify the appropriate people within the military that it had occurred. And whatever they do with that information after that obviously falls within whatever, you know, procedures they have. But the notification would and quite frankly should have been made, something as serious as a DUI.

The one thing I do want to mention, because this is information that we don't normally get with active shooter situations, all five victims are stable and expected to survive. And that is great news. Had it not been for the heroism of the soldiers that were present and were able to tackle him, I mean, we don't know if his end game was to commit suicide or kill more people or shoot more people.

But their quick intervention made a difference. And that's just absolutely something that we need to really make note of. And I'm very proud of what they were able to do.

And the fact that we've got five victims that really will survive their injuries is great news.

KEILAR: Yes, three of them requiring surgery, we learned. So, you know, a tough road ahead for these soldiers who were shot. But thank goodness, yes, they survived.

RAMSEY: I'm not trying to minimize it.

KEILAR: Oh, no, no, I know you're not. I too noted what great news that was, because I think we were worried it was going to end perhaps differently.

I do, I have another question for you, Chief. But first, let's bring up, we have the booking photo, I believe. Is this from the May DUI?

This is from the DUI arrest that came from the traffic stop from Quornelius Radford, Sergeant Quornelius Radford back in May. And it's interesting, Chief, that you note that normally this is the kind of thing that would be reported if police officers had an awareness that this was a service member, that they would actually report it to the military installation.

Talk about why that could be helpful, because I think before we were wondering as we discussed this, hey, did this lead to some kind of issue with his employment that was causing problems for him? But now perhaps it's something that it could have been a data point of a troubled individual that would have been helpful for his chain of command to know.

RAMSEY: Well, one important point is he may never have informed the officers that he was a member of the military. If he's off duty, he's out of uniform and so forth, they may not have known that. But if they did know that, then it would be typical that you would make a notification.

It's just like if we made an arrest of another police officer from another jurisdiction, you notify that agency that that person was in custody and what they were being charged with. That's just a normal course of action. But of course, they may not have known that he was a member of the military.

KEILAR: Can I ask you, should they have known? I mean, tell us, walk us through as an arrest, would you have the suspect's wallet? Because I mean, obviously there's going to be military, there's a cat card in there, right?

So you would expect they'd see it.

RAMSEY: I would think they would probably know during the processing of the individual that he was a member of the military. I don't know what he had on him at the time, if he even had a wallet or a driver's license. I mean, you just don't know all the circumstances.

But I can say this, it's going to be looked into because that is something that would be a procedure that would be followed by an officer. So you would want to dig a little deeper into that to find out the circumstances around that particular DUI arrest to find out, you know, if the officers failed to make that notification.

SANCHEZ: Chief Ramsey, please stand by. We're going to take a quick break as we've just gotten more information regarding this incident at Fort Stewart.

All five shooting victims expected to survive a relief coming from military officials. They're all of them right now in stable condition. And we've learned the identity of the shooter, Sergeant Quornelius Radford. Still a lot of questions to be answered, though, about how he had a personal weapon on a military base, something that is typically not allowed.

Stay with CNN. We're back in just moments.

[15:50:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SANCHEZ: We are following the breaking news out of Fort Stewart in Georgia.

A suspect apprehended there. Officials just confirming moments ago that it is 28-year-old Sergeant Quornelius Radford, someone who had not previously been deployed into combat, who has been interviewed by Army investigators after opening fire on some of his co-workers. We understand that several soldiers who were nearby apprehended him and helped to respond to the shooting.

Officials saying that their actions prevented further bloodshed. And fortunately, we're getting very good news about the suspected or rather the victims, his targets.

KEILAR: Yes, that's exactly right. Five victims here, his co-workers, we have learned.

[15:55:00]

Three of the five of them requiring surgery, but all five of them in stable condition. We learned from the general there, the commanding general of the base expected to recover, expected to survive. So that is certainly good news.

Let's go to Natasha Bertrand, who is at the Pentagon. Natasha, talk to us a little bit about what you're hearing in the very latest here.

NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Brianna, so we're still waiting for the suspect's full service record from the U.S. Army. As we heard from that press conference, he had not previously deployed in combat and he was a member of this 2nd Armored Brigade combat team at Fort Stewart. But that's pretty much the extent that we know about him at this point officially, other than that he was -- he is, I should say, a sergeant around 28-years-old who was serving there.

But one of the things I think that was most notable as well about that press conference was when they started talking about the weapon that he used. He apparently used a personal handgun, not a military-issued weapon, which is notable because, of course, troops are not supposed to have personal weapons on base. And so one of the big questions here, and something that the commander also pointed out during the press conference, is just how he was able to get this personal handgun on his person and essentially at his place of work, surrounded by his co-workers.

This was not connected to any kind of training event, according to the commander, and this was strictly a personal handgun that he was able to essentially conceal and carry with him.

Now, it's worth noting that on a military base, it is not permitted to have these kinds of personal weapons. You sign weapons into an armory, you sign them out if you need them for training. The only people really carrying around these kinds of weapons are military police.

And so, you know, the question now is, will base security be tightened? Are there going to be additional checks to make sure that people aren't able to carry these kinds of weapons on base? Because it's worth noting as well that if you have an access card, which people do when they go in and out of a base every day, the military police aren't necessarily checking every single vehicle as they come in and out. And so a lot of questions remain about just how this individual was able to get this weapon so close to his colleagues, who we should note had to actually tackle him to subdue him until law enforcement arrived -- Brianna, Boris.

SANCHEZ: Natasha, thank you so much.

We have with us Retired General Ty Seidule and Chief Charles Ramsey back along for the conversation. General Seidule, when it comes to bringing weapons on base, I mean, are you -- do you imagine we're going to see some change in policy where inspections become more rigorous?

How realistic is that a possibility?

SEIDULE: Yes, it's so hard. I mean, I think that you may see that, but it's so easy to conceal a handgun going anywhere. So even they know that you're not allowed to bring them on, but I don't see that that's going to be, you just have to trust your soldiers because most people aren't doing it like that.

I would say that what's going to happen to the soldier now, which I think is interesting, is he now falls under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, a completely different justice system than every other person has. So I think that's what's really interesting. And what's that going to mean?

First, he's been read his Article 31B rights, which means that he is -- he had his Miranda rights. Now he'll have a trial defense counsel assigned to him, another Army person that does that, and be interviewed. But he may not choose to do that.

Then there'll be an Article 32 hearing, a grand jury type thing that will be, an officer will be appointed to investigate that. And then probably a court-martial, a general court-martial. And if convicted, then he would go to jail at Fort Leavenworth at the disciplinary barracks.

So completely different justice system for a soldier who commits a crime on an Army post.

KEILAR: And Chief, final thought from you, as we have now learned a lot more about what happened today.

RAMSEY: Well, again, we're just very fortunate that there were no deaths that occurred as a result of this. The quick action of those officers on the base made a huge difference between life and death.

The other thing that I've neglected to mention as far as the notification for the DUI off base, you know, in most jurisdictions, and I'm not sure about Georgia, but DUI is a printable offense.

So even if the arresting officers initially did not know because he wasn't carrying ID at the time it would indicate he was a member of the military. When the prints came back, it would be an indication that he was in fact in the service. And so that would be a way in which you would know.

So I'd be more interested -- I would be interested in knowing exactly, you know, what took place there. But again, we're just very, we're just very fortunate that we're not talking about fatalities here. And thank God that's the case.

SANCHEZ: Yes, no doubt. Again, the brave actions of those soldiers saving lives, undoubtedly. Chief Ramsey, General Seidule, thank you both for the analysis and perspective.

[16:00:00]

A lot of avenues of investigation remain, namely how this suspect was able to bring that weapon into the base and what sparked this. Clearly something that investigators are going to focus on as they likely interview not only the suspect, but his victims.

KEILAR: Yes, these were his co-workers who they say -- the army says he targeted and who also tackled and subdued him in quite an act of heroism. All five of those shot in stable condition and expected to recover. That is the good news.

And "THE ARENA" with Kasie Hunt starts right now.

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