(Corrects dates of Army service to 1992 to 1998, instead of
1982 to 1998)
Aug 6 (Reuters) - Women at the Sikh Temple in the Milwaukee
suburb of Oak Creek were busily preparing lunch in the community
kitchen on Sunday when two children burst in and screamed
frantically they had seen a man with a gun outside.
People began running in every direction, and 14 women, along
with the two children, rushed into a narrow pantry. There was no
lock, and so the women pressed their bodies up against the door
to keep anyone from entering, witnesses said.
"Everyone was falling on top of one another," said Parminder
Toor, 54, speaking in Punjabi as her daughter-in-law, Jaskiran
Kaur, translated. "It was dark and we were all crammed in."
The children -- who were not immediately named, but who
worshipers said were not yet teenagers - - had been playing near
a window in another room when they saw the gunman. Their parents
had gone to a nearby grocery store to buy juice for the weekly
community lunch, witnesses said.
Six people, as well as the shooter, were killed on Sunday
morning when the gunman entered the temple and fired on
worshippers with a handgun as they prepared for religious
services. Police identified the gunman as Wade Michael Page, 40,
who was in the U.S. Army from 1992 to 1998.
Satwant Singh Kaleka, the 65-year-old president of the
congregation, was among the victims. The others who died were
Sita Singh, 41; Ranjit Singh, 49; Prakash Singh, 39; Paramjit
Kaur, 41; and Suveg Singh, 84. A police officer was critically
wounded, and three other people were treated in hospital, two of
them for serious injuries.
Witnesses described a chaotic scene as members of Oak
Creek's closely-knit Sikh community dashed into any enclosed
space they could find including the basement, a bathroom and the
kitchen pantry, not knowing if it were a lone gunman or a group
of shooters.
HUDDLED IN THE PANTRY
Family members desperately called relatives who they knew to
be at the temple, and warned late-comers to stay away.
In the pantry, the women and the two children huddled
together for more than two hours, as smoke and the smell of hot
cooking oil from the abandoned skillets filled the air.
One of the women who made it into the pantry had been shot
in the hand, and there was "blood everywhere," said Toor.
Toor, who was born in India and has been worshiping at the
temple since it opened five years ago, described the two
children as heroes.
"They were telling all the women to be still and to be
brave, and they were telling the women not to cry," said Toor.
"They are the heroes who saved the women in the closet."
Toor's daughter-in-law, Jaskiran Kaur said she had left the
temple with her two young children minutes before the shooting
began. The service begins at about 11:00 a.m. local time, and
she said she prefers to worship earlier in the day.
Kaur said she greeted the temple president in the customary
fashion, with palms pressed together. Later, he presented her
children with traditional sweets. "I just feel like at least I
got to say good-bye," she said, her voice breaking. She
described the temple president as a "nice, humble guy."
She said they had last been together as a community on
Saturday for a celebration of a women's festival that is
celebrated in India.
"We all danced and we were all laughing, and everyone looked
so beautiful," she said.
(Reporting By Edith Honan; Editing by Greg McCune and David
Storey)