'They invade my thoughts every day,' officer says of memories of Pittsburgh synagogue attack carnage

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Pittsburgh SWAT Officer John Persin remembers the smell inside the Tree of Life synagogue's Pervin Chapel on the morning of Oct. 27, 2018.

Iron from the spilled blood.

Persin was one of the first officers to enter the synagogue in response to an active shooter call there that morning.

He still remembers it vividly.

"They invade my thoughts every day — the violence, the smells, the sights," Persin testified Tuesday in federal court.

He described clearing the space in Pervin Chapel from back to front looking for the suspect, later identified as Robert Bowers. Once officers determined the shooter wasn't there, Persin said, they began looking for victims.

He said officers found one woman, later identified as Andrea Wedner, lying under her mother, Rose Mallinger, who had been killed. Wedner had been shot in the arm.

"She was crying, hysterical," Persin said.

He also described finding Bernice and Sylvan Simon. The couple, who had been married in that very chapel more than 60 years earlier, were together in a pew closer to the front. A cane hung over the bench in front of them, and a phone lay near Bernice Simon's hand. She was on the phone with 911 when she was killed.

Persin was the last witness to testify Tuesday, the sixth day of Bowers’ federal trial. He is accused of killing 11 people and wounding several others in the Squirrel Hill synagogue that day.

Bowers, 50, of Baldwin, faces 63 federal charges, including 11 counts each of obstructing the free exercise of religion resulting in death and hate crimes resulting in death.

He could face the death penalty if convicted.

The victims included members of the Tree of Life-Or L’Simcha, Dor Hadash and New Light congregations.

In addition to Mallinger, 97; Bernice Simon, 84, and her husband, Sylvan Simon, 86, those killed included brothers David Rosenthal, 54, and Cecil Rosenthal, 59; Dan Stein, 71; Irving Younger, 69; Dr. Jerry Rabinowitz, 66; Joyce Fienberg, 75; Melvin Wax, 87 and Richard Gottfried, 65.

Earlier on Tuesday, SWAT Team Leader Andrew Miller described following Officers Tim Matson and Michael Saldutte into an upstairs classroom in the synagogue.

There were only a couple of rooms left to search, he said, so they knew it was likely the attacker was inside.

Matson entered the room first and then immediately buckled to the floor after being shot in the leg, Miller said.

Both Miller and Saldutte, who dove in front of Matson to protect him, returned fire.

As Saldutte worked to get Matson out of the room, Miller saw the muzzle flash from Bowers’ AR-15 rifle.

He said he could feel bullets spraying all around him as dust and drywall particles filled the air.

"He was just missing," Miller testified Tuesday. "Just missing me."

The debris made it appear like the darkened room was filled with fog.

Miller tried to illuminate the space, but that made it worse. Turning off his light, he was able to see the muzzle flash.

As the gun battle continued, Miller said the door to a metal cabinet against the wall flew open, with shots landing all around it.

Miller aimed at that door, firing repeatedly because he believed Bowers was on the other side.

"I didn't want to get shot," he said. "I didn't want to die."

Once he knew Matson and Saldutte had gotten out, Miller said he retreated to help his wounded colleague.

Miller and Saldutte dragged Matson down the steps and removed his ballistic helmet and body armor.

Miller saw a bullet wound to the right side of Matson's head.

"But he was still talking," Miller testified. "I didn't know how somebody could have survived that wound."

He started to yell at Matson to stand up.

"I wanted him to aid his own rescue," Miller told the jury. "For my own selfish reason, I wanted to see that he was OK."

Matson said he couldn't get up.

"He said, ‘I’m all (messed) up," Miller recounted. "I’m (messed) up."

Once Miller was in the care of medical personnel, Miller ran back upstairs to rejoin the fight against Bowers.

Other SWAT officers had filled in for him, so Miller stayed back about 8 feet from the room as Officer Clint Thimons negotiated with Bowers, who had been wounded and surrendered, to come out.

As Bowers emerged from the room several minutes later, crawling on his stomach, Miller said he removed a gun from his waistband and later one from an ankle holster.

He also attempted to secure the suspect's hands with zip tie-style handcuffs.

"I had blood from Matson's injuries on my hands," Miller said. "I had (Bowers’) blood on my hands also. It kept slipping through my fingers."

Another officer tightened the cuffs.

Persin testified that he and SWAT Officer Anthony Burke had gone to the upper-most room in the building looking for the shooter when they heard the gunfight break out in the room below.

"Burke began backpedaling down the hall," Persin said.

They heard fellow officers shouting that Matson had been hit, and Burke reached into the room to help drag him out.

When he did, Persin said, Burke was shot in the right arm.

As Matson was removed to receive medical treatment, Persin took Burke back to the room upstairs. He put a tourniquet on Burke's arm to try to slow the bleeding and then asked him if he could still fight, even though Burke was right-handed.

"(Expletive) yeah," Burke replied.

Persin removed Burke's gun from his holster and put it in the man's left hand. He told him to stay in the corner of the room, where he remained until Bowers had been taken into custody.

After that, Persin said he prepared to move Burke, who had become listless from blood loss, downstairs for medical treatment.

The plan, he said, was to throw a flash bang in the room Bowers had been in to ensure there were no other threats there.

But when the device was thrown, it bounced off the doorway and hit Persin.

It went off.

"It stunned me," he said.

Persin learned later that he sustained permanent hearing loss in his left ear and can no longer hear higher-pitched frequencies such as children's voices.

Persin also has tinnitus, or ringing in his ears.

"It constantly reminds me," he said.

Prior to Persin's testimony, three forensic pathologists who were with the Allegheny County Medical Examiner's Office in 2018, testified about the wounds suffered by the 11 victims.

Dr. W. Ashton Ennis performed autopsies on Cecil Rosenthal, Stein, Younger and Wax. Dr. Baiyang Xu examined Fienberg, Gottfried, Mallinger and Rabinowitz. Dr. Todd Luckasevic handled autopsies of David Rosenthal, Bernice Simon and Sylvan Simon.

All of the victims but one suffered multiple gunshot wounds from a rifle, they said. The trio of pathologists detailed the entrance and exit wounds and the extensive damage caused by the bullets, from fractures and crush injuries to pierced organs and the near-amputation of an extremity. Prosecutors presented diagrams, photographs and X-rays, as well as photos of bullet fragments recovered from the bodies.

As Ennis testified, several members of the victims’ families remained in the courtroom, often looking down and away from the monitors in the room showing the injuries.

Ennis discussed the difference between wounds caused by bullets shot from a rifle versus a handgun.

"The (rifle) bullet moves much more quickly … that energy translates to the body and creates a much more destructive wound," Ennis testified.

Luckasevic told the jury that a bullet fired from a handgun travels between 900 and 1,300 feet per second. A rifle round, he said, travels three times that fast.

"You can see the massive amount of energy a rifle has," he said.

Luckasevic said such rifle rounds can cause a "lead snowstorm" of bullet fragments seen on an X-ray.

"It usually breaks apart once it hits the body," he said.

One of the victims was shot at contact range, which Luckasevic described as the muzzle of a weapon touching a target. A collared shirt the victim was wearing was melted "like burned plastic," he said while jurors were shown a photograph of the bloodied shirt and irregular hole from the bullet.

"Just like the clothing got seared from the hot, burning gases, the skin got seared," Luckasevic testified.

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