x
Breaking News
More () »

Cincinnati shooting survivor recovering from 12 gunshot wounds

There, on the ground inside the revolving door, she said, "I began to make my peace with God."
Courtesy Waller Austin

As Whitney Austin recovers, the 37-year-old Louisville native is recounting in detail for the first time the harrowing moments after she was shot by the gunman who on Thursday killed three and wounded two.

Her thoughts raced as she lay on the ground, shot 12 times.

She was determined to say goodbye to her husband and children. She thought about her passionate feelings toward controlling gun access and eliminating gun violence. She recalls thinking the situation was ridiculous, unreal.

"How did I get selected to be a victim of a mass shooting?" she thought. "... And was this really how I was going to go down?"

The time passing felt like an eternity.

There, on the ground inside the revolving door, she said, "I began to make my peace with God."

RELATED | 4 minutes, 28 seconds: How the Cincinnati shooting unfolded

Austin, who later learned she'd been shot 12 times, was pulled to safety by Cincinnati police officer Al Staples, with the help of others, after the gunman was shot and killed by police.

Omar Santa Perez, 29, killed three and wounded two. He fired 35 rounds in the attack, which lasted less than five minutes. He had no connection to the victims and police have not identified a motive.

Once Whitney was safe outside the building, she felt excruciating pain in her right arm when her rescuers sat her up, she recalled in a statement Sunday. She was wounded in her neck, chest, arms, torso and foot. When the paramedics arrived, they began packing her wounds and wrapping tourniquets.

It had been a normal day for the University of Louisville and Male High School graduate. Thursdays were when she typically traveled to meetings at the Cincinnati headquarters of Fifth Third Bank, where she has worked since 2003, working her way from bank teller to senior product manager for digital lending.

But this morning, at 9:19 a.m., 12 minutes after police say the shooter began his rampage, an officer called her husband, Waller, to tell him Whitney had been shot.

Austin could hear Waller and begged to speak to him. Someone put a phone up to her ear.

“‘Waller, I have been shot so many times and it hurts so badly, but I’m breathing and they’re taking care of me," she remembers telling him. "Get up here.”

When Waller heard her voice, he remembers being able to breathe.

Austin, who has continued her recovery at the University of Cincinnati Medical Center in the past several days, was moved out of the intensive care unit on Saturday night.

She's since video chatted with her two children, ages 5 and 7, over FaceTime. The night before the shooting, she'd gone to a rollerskating party with her two kids and friends from school.

She says she's filled with so much gratitude, and is thinking of the future.

"Now, I need to do something with all of that gratitude," she said.

MORE | 4 people dead, including gunman, in downtown Cincinnati shooting

Before You Leave, Check This Out