Court worker describes final moments with dying security officer

In the frantic moments after a gunman opened fire two weeks ago in the Lloyd George U.S. Courthouse, a young woman found herself at the side of security officer Stan Cooper.

Cooper lay face down, and she didn't know it then, but he was about to take his last breaths.

"I looked down and right next to my leg was Stan," Denise Saavedra said Friday. "The closest part of him was his head. My first impression was that he probably took cover and fell. There was blood, and I thought that he broke his nose."

Saavedra, 28, asked Cooper, 72, whether he was OK. He didn't respond.

A period of silence followed.

"I just heard Stan breathing. I realized he was injured when he didn't respond. And from there on I asked him if he knew Jesus Christ -- twice. And when he didn't respond, I placed my hands over him and started asking the Lord to save him," Saavedra said, fighting back tears. "And then he didn't say anything, and I didn't hear him anymore. And that was basically it. The marshals came and got me."

Saavedra has worked as a court recorder for Senior U.S. District Judge Lloyd George -- the building's namesake -- since April 2007. Her job involves recording audio of the proceedings that take place in George's courtroom. The deeply religious woman who wears a near-constant smile said she has been a "believer" since she was 18. She is married and has two young children.

During a courthouse interview Friday, a week after she returned to work, Saavedra spoke publicly for the first time about her experience on the day of the shooting.

"I really believe that God put me there, and I can go back and tell you that he had me up in the morning praying," she said.

Saavedra prays and reads the Bible every morning, but Jan. 4 began earlier than most for her. She woke up at midnight that Monday with an upset stomach and couldn't go back to sleep. She opened her Bible and began reading.

She soon went back to sleep but continued to wake up every hour on the hour: 1 a.m., 2 a.m., 3 a.m., 4 a.m., 5 a.m.

Saavedra now believes God was waking her.

At 5 a.m, she gave up on sleep. She prayed. She read her Bible. She got ready for work.

Saavedra was listening to a Christian radio station as she pulled into the employee parking lot outside the federal courthouse in downtown Las Vegas. She remembers the last song she heard: "Safe" by Phil Wickham.

"You will be safe in His arms. You will be safe in His arms."

Saavedra left her car at exactly 8 a.m. and began climbing the stairs that lead to the plaza in front of the courthouse entrance. She noticed a man in a trench coat facing Las Vegas Boulevard. She likes to greet everyone she passes on the way to work with a "good morning," but this man wouldn't make eye contact with her. She now believes he was the gunman, Johnny Lee Wicks, who held a grudge against the federal government.

She entered the building at the same time as a law clerk whose name she did not know. She would later learn he was Brian Christensen, who works for Chief U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt.

Saavedra passed through the security checkpoint and said "good morning" to the court security officers, including Cooper, who were stationed at the entrance. She remembers one of the officers, Jack Eklund, smiling at her.

She took two or three steps before she heard what she now knows were gunshots.

"I thought it was perhaps a box that fell," she said.

Sounds echo loudly in the round courthouse lobby with its high glass ceiling.

"I turned around to face the front to see what it was, and that's when Jack yelled to get down and took me down," Saavedra said.

Eklund pulled her behind a wall alongside the security checkpoint.

"I did panic, and all I could think of was to pray," Saavedra said.

She was sitting on the floor when she heard what she by this time knew were gunshots, and Eklund again pulled her to safety -- back to a spot next to Cooper.

Saavedra said she knew Cooper was hurt, but she didn't want to believe he was dying.

"Even after the whole incident, I was hoping that he was OK," she said.

She has only a vague memory of the rest of the events: hearing officers tell her to run, taking cover with others in the courthouse cafeteria. All the while, the lyrics to "Safe" kept coming back to her.

"That song kept playing in my head over and over and over again after the incident," Saavedra said. "It started in the cafeteria, actually."

Later that day, she heard the news that Cooper, a former Las Vegas police officer, had been killed. Wicks, 66, was also killed, in a gunbattle that ended across the street.

Deputy U.S. Marshal Richard "Joe" Gardner, 48, was shot in the arm during the gunfight, and Christensen, 31, was struck by pellets from Wicks' shotgun.

Saavedra said God gave her a Bible passage -- 2 Timothy 4:17-18 -- the day after the shooting. It reads:

"But the Lord stood with me and strengthened me, so that the message might be preached fully through me, and that all the Gentiles might hear. Also I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion. And the Lord will deliver me from every evil work and preserve me for His heavenly kingdom. To Him be glory forever and ever. Amen!"

Saavedra said God's strength, along with the prayers of friends and family, has helped her recover from the traumatic incident. She went to Cooper's funeral on Monday at Central Christian Church in Henderson and said she has communicated with some of his relatives.

"I just want everyone to hear that God was there with him," Saavedra said. "Although there was a tragedy, he was there with Stan. And I found out later on that he was a believer also."

Contact reporter Carri Geer Thevenot at cgeer@reviewjournal.com or 702-384-8710.