“It’s hard to comprehend it, it’s hard to understand it but a lot of people are struggling. A lot of people are stressed,” Perkins said. “We walk by faith, not by sight. We still have to believe that there’s goodness in most people.”
Minter was being held at the Dallas County jail.
Minter had been arrested before, police said. Court records show he was charged with misdemeanor menacing after he was accused as part of a group of three men who stopped James Campbell, 19, while he walked through a neighborhood in Selma on Oct. 15, 2010.
Campbell said in a statement to police that one man held a gun on him and punched him in the face while Minter and another man also held guns on him. No charges were filed until Campbell told police about the incident seven months later, and the case was dismissed without prosecution on June 30, 2011.
Court records do not indicate why prosecutors threw out the case.
Authorities also are investigating whether Minter violated a protective order, Muhannad said.
Jackson said worshippers having to be alert and on guard in a place meant to be a sanctuary was a shameful commentary on society. In June, nine black parishioners were gunned down during Bible study at a Charleston, South Carolina, church. A white man who had been photographed with the Confederate flag is charged. In the Alabama shooting, officials haven’t mentioned race as a factor in the shooting at the church, where the congregation — including Minter, his former girlfriend and their son — is mostly black. The pastor is white.
“We’ve reached the point where all churches are gonna have to have cameras and check for weapons,” Jackson said. “That’s the way society is going now. It’s the world we live in now.”
(Photo: AP)
Pastor, Church Members Hailed as Heroes in Church Shooting was originally published on blackamericaweb.com
