Shooting death occurs in church
Dispute involved 2 members during service at Keystone Fellowship
MONTGOMERY TOWNSHIP >> One man is dead and authorities are considering whether to bring charges after a dispute ended with gunfire in Keystone Fellowship Church during its 11 a.m. service Sunday.
Police arrived at the church to find Robert Braxton, a 27-yearold township resident, with a gunshot wound to the chest, according to Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin Steele, who spoke at the scene later that afternoon.
Braxton was pronounced dead at Abington Lansdale Hospital shortly after noon.
Steele did not release the identity of the other person in the altercation at the Sunday afternoon press conference, but said the man was not being held in custody and was cooperating with police.
“The investigation into this is ongoing; we are going to have to determine whether the shooting was justified under the law. We are still interviewing witnesses and the autopsy of the
case is scheduled for tomorrow at the Montgomery County Coroner’s Office,” Steele said.
Steele said the second person involved was treated for injuries from the altercation, though the extent and nature of those injuries was not revealed. The person had been treated and released by the time of the press conference at 4 p.m.
According to Steele, the person had a concealed carry permit for
his weapon. Braxton was unarmed so far as investigators have determined.
The dispute occurred inside the church, Steele said, in a space between two sections of seating while music was playing during the service.
Both Braxton and the other person involved were members of the church, but Steele said he did not know of any personal history between the two. He said police are speaking with witnesses to understand what led to the altercation and what exactly transpired between the two churchgoers.
“There were a number of people at the service, I believe in the hundreds, so we got a lot of interviews to do. That is ongoing, it’s going to take some time to do,” Steele said.
Speaking to reporters outside the church Sunday afternoon, 25-yearold Breeana Somers from Towamencin said she was at the service when she heard three pops, which sounded like champagne opening, amid the music of the church service. For a moment she and the other church members were unsure what happened.
Then someone said, “Shots fired,” and everyone
dropped to the floor to find what shelter they could in the rows of chairs, she said.
The music was loud and Somers said she did not hear any argument that may have happened leading up to the shooting.
“I’ve never felt [the] shock, and the electricity that went through my body thinking that something could have happened to my daughter, that she got shot or my granddaughter got shot,” Breeana’s father Joel Somers said Sunday afternoon. “I broke all kind of speed records to get over here and I was just so relieved, I’m still shaking, to
find out she was okay.”
Churchgoers were reportedly told prior to this weekend’s services to not take pictures or video of a guest speaker scheduled to make an appearance. Joel Somers said the guest who spoke at the 9 a.m. service was a missionary, and the directive was to protect his work in dangerous
parts of the world. Steele said there was no connection the police had seen between the incident and the speaker.
Steele acknowledged the particular tragedy of the situation but said authorities will focus on the evidence and where it leads in determining whether to bring charges.