Pittsburgh synagogue shooting trial of Robert Bowers: live updates

The moments before the shooting took place were, in many cases, light and even funny, according to the testimony of several survivors on Wednesday.

Augie Siriano ate bagels and drank tea with David and Cecil Rosenthal, two brothers with intellectual disabilities, that morning when he arrived for work. Siriano had been the janitor at Tree of Life for 25 years and would often spend these first moments helping the Rosenthals tie their shoes and ties.

When Barry Werber showed up for services later that day, he saw Cecil trying to have a conversation with 87-year-old Melvin Wax. Wax was known for telling endless jokes without ever repeating them. But Cecil couldn't understand what Wax was saying and tried to tell Wax this. But Wax couldn't hear out of one of his ears. So Wax kept telling jokes until Cecil kind of gave up and went back to where his service would be held.

"This is a very fond memory of mine," Werber said.

Martin Gaynor, Dan Leger, and Jerry Rabinowitz were joking around before services started, Gaynor said. Leger and Rabinowitz were friends and sometimes coworkers who ate lunch together at UPMC Shadyside Hospital, where Leger was a nurse and Rabinowitz a doctor.

But then their stories diverged.

Leger and Rabinowitz were trained in medicine, and they instinctively ran toward the shooting, even though Leger said in retrospect it might not have been the best idea.

Gaynor, on the other hand, had recently had an active shooter training at work and when he heard gunshots, he ran the opposite direction, faster than he had run since high school, he said. He exited through doors that just the previous month had been barred shut, after a building inspection concluded that the bars needed to be removed in case of an emergency and people needed to leave. Because it was the Sabbath, he didn't have a phone on him, and had to stop at a neighbor's house to call 911. Gaynor later found a small scab on his arm in a place where his clothing also had a hole in it.

Rabinowitz, who had run in the other direction, was shot and killed. Leger was shot in the abdomen and fell onto a stairway, unable to move, for 45 minutes. A bullet had broken his hip bone, exploding his bladder and rupturing his intestines. His breathing became shallower and the pain grew increasingly intense. It was the Sabbath so he didn't have a phone on him to call for help.

Leger had served as a chaplain for hundreds of other people near the end of their lives and now found himself saying the Jewish prayer for forgiveness for himself. "I reviewed my life and thought about the wonder of my life and the beauty of it and the happiness I had experienced in my life. The joy of having two sons," he said. "A wife … another wife previous to that wife. And all the wonderful friends I had in this world."

In the closet with Carol Black, who testified earlier in the day, Werber dialed 911 with an old model "dumb phone" that he said, fortunately turned dark after he called 911. So he and Black were able to wait in the pitch black dark of the closet they were hiding in.

Werber, 81, had served four years in the air force, but when a 911 operator asked him if he was hurt, he could be heard on the 911 recording whisper, "No, just scared as all get out."

A third day of testimony is slated for Thursday.

Carol Black began attending services at the New Light congregation about 11 years ago, she told the court Wednesday, joining her brother Richard Gottfried, who had been attending since 1992. Black had hurt her hip exercising and was looking for something to do. She then became so involved with the congregation that she had a Bat Mitzvah as an adult. In 2018, New Light held its services at the Tree of Life synagogue.

On October 27, 2018, Black saw her brother walking into the synagogue as she drove up to park but didn’t get a chance to talk to him before she walked into the start of service, a couple minutes late. Her brother was preparing food in the kitchen. Black was getting ready to take out her head covering and her prayer shawl when she heard a loud noise upstairs. New Light met in the basement of the Tree of Life Synagogue. She and two other men at the service that morning realized it was gun fire and jammed themselves into a crowded, dark closet where they waited silently.

The shooting stopped for awhile and Melvin Wax — an 87-year-old congregant who would park his car around the corner so other more infirm members could park in the nearby parking lot — opened the door. The shooter noticed the door and shot Wax. He fell just inches from Black, who was crouched behind the metal door of the closet.

“It just occurred to me that if I was calm — and I just kept telling myself over and over again that I was going to be fine — nothing would happen to me,” she said. “I just thought if I remained calm I would not give my position away.”

The other congregant hiding in the closet with her, Barry Werber, called 911 on his phone and they waited silently there for a long time, sometimes hearing more gunfire.

After two SWAT team members finally rescued Black and Werber, she said goodbye to Wax, silently, as she stepped over his body. Later she heard on a police radio that there were eight people confirmed dead and others that had been sent to the hospital. Black said a prayer that her brother might be one of the people on the way to the hospital.

The court played a 911 call that her brother, Gottfried made, asking for help, just before he was killed.

“He was frightened,” Black said.

In the long run-up to the trial, Robert Bowers’ lawyers did little to cast doubt on whether he was the gunman and instead focused on trying to save his life. As an indication that the trial’s guilt-or-innocence phase would be almost a foregone conclusion, they spent little time during jury selection asking how potential jurors would reach a verdict.

Instead, they focused on the penalty phase and how jurors would decide whether to impose the death penalty in a case of a man charged with hate-motivated killings in a house of worship. The defense lawyers, who recently said Bowers has schizophrenia and brain impairments, probed whether potential jurors could consider factors such as mental illness or a difficult childhood.

The families of those killed are divided over whether the government should pursue the death penalty, but most have voiced support for it.

The three congregations have spoken out against antisemitism and other forms of bigotry since the attack. The Tree of Life congregation also is working with partners on plans to overhaul its current structure, which still stands but has been closed since the shootings, by creating a complex that would house a sanctuary, museum, memorial and center for fighting antisemitism.

The death penalty trial, which is being presided over by Judge Robert Colville, is proceeding three years after now-President Joe Biden said during his 2020 campaign that he would work to end capital punishment at the federal level and in states that still use it. His attorney general, Merrick Garland, has temporarily paused executions to review policies and procedures, but federal prosecutors continue to vigorously work to uphold death sentences that have been issued and, in some cases, to pursue new death sentences at trial.

Read more.

David Klug

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AP

Before the end of the day, Rabbi Jeffrey Myers walked through what it was like for him on the day of the shooting. The court played an audio recording of his call to 911, while he hid in a second-floor bathroom, with his hand gripping the doorknob the entire time, in case the shooter ever tried to enter. The lock on the door wasn't working, so Myers said he was planning to fight if he felt any movement to open the door.

At one point during the call, as the shots became louder and closer, Myers said he couldn't talk to the 911 dispatcher anymore. At that point, Myers said, he thought he was going to die. He thought about hanging up and calling his wife but decided that he couldn't leave her with the burden of hearing his last moments. "I thought about the history of my people, how we have been persecuted, hunted and slaughtered for centuries," he told prosecutors. "and how all of them must have felt at the moments before their death."

Myers decided to stay on the line with 911 and began quietly reciting the Jewish prayer asking God to forgive the sins of the people in his congregation who might not have been able to wish for forgiveness in the sanctuary below. "I wasn't angry at my God because it wasn't God who did this, and I was prepared to meet my fate."

The court stopped, while Myers wiped away tears off his face.

The prosecution's questions ended, after showing a prayer book Myers had kept, that appeared to have a bullet hole in it, which Myers had decided not to bury as custom. "It's a witness to the horror of the day," he said. "One day when I am not there, this book tells a story that needs to be told."

That was the last question before court adjourned for the day.

The prosecution called Tree of Life Rabbi Jeffrey Myers and spent more than 90 minutes walking the jury through the faces of the victims and intricately walking through the layout and history of the Tree of Life synagogue building itself.

Myers also gave the jury an expansive tour of the relevant history, including the founding of the Jewish religion 4,000 years ago, the start in the mid-1800s of the moderate Conservative denomination that he is a member of, and then the founding of Tree of Life Congregation itself in 1864. The rabbi gave explanations of various Jewish prayers, the difference between Hebrew and Yiddish and even how long it takes to handwrite a Torah — a full year.

The Tree of Life synagogue had on display a Torah that was rescued from a town that was destroyed by the Germans in World War II, Myers said, and none of the town’s inhabitants survived. But the Torah was kept by the Nazis. Normally, Myers said, Jewish tradition requires that damaged Torahs are buried. But this Torah was kept in a protective case, he said, to bear witness to what happened to the Jews during the Holocaust.

And in the late 1990s Judah Samet, a Tree of Life member and a holocaust survivor, flew to England and purchased two return plane tickets to bring the Torah back where it was put on display, including during the shooting in 2018. Samet — who passed away last year — was outside but never entered the synagogue on the day of the shooting.

The prosecution called the first witness, Shannon Basa-Sabol, a dispatcher on the day of the shooting, and then played a 911 call made by Bernice Simon to the dispatcher on the morning of the shooting.

“Tree of Life,” Simon told Basa-Sabol right away. “We’re being attacked.”

Simon said her husband had been shot and wasn’t responding. The dispatcher told her supervisor that she could hear the shots being fired.

“Please hurry,” Simon said. “Please, please, please.”

Simon was shot during the call. The dispatcher stayed on the call until law enforcement arrived trying to get Simon to press a button on her phone to see if she was still alive.

Both Simon and her husband, Sylvan, who had been married at the same synagogue more than 50 years before, died on the floor.

David Klug

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AP

Judy Clarke, the lead attorney for defense, gave her opening statement Tuesday morning, referencing the specific language of how a hate crime is defined in federal law on a screen.

"11 lives were taken. Others were wounded. Still others torn and shattered. And forever and abruptly changed," Clarke said. "Parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters, friends, taken. Loved by people in this community, very well loved by this community, they are gone. The loss that occurred is immeasurable. This senseless act and the loss and devastation were caused by Robert Bowers. There is no disagreement."

Clarke said the defense will not dispute any of the facts of the case. "Let me be clear on October 27, 2018, Robert Bowers, the man seated at that table, loaded with ammunition and firearms, entered the Tree of Life synagogue, he had his AR-15 Colt rifle, he had three glock pistols on him and several magazines of ammunition and he shot every person he saw," she said.

She continued. "So you may be looking at me right now and saying why are we here? What is this all about?"

Clarke indicated the defense lawyers will challenge whether or not Bowers was rational when he made the decision and whether he was animated by hatred of the Jewish people when he decided to enter the Tree of Life Synagogue. She read some of the very statements that the prosecutors say Bowers said right after he was arrested — but Clarke drew a different conclusion.

Bowers’ internet postings, Clarke said, show he was focused on trying to stop a refugee group, HIAS, that Bowers thought was terrorizing children and was killing people. The reason Bowers chose the Tree of Life synagogue, wasn't because they were Jewish, per se, but because the Dor Hadash congregation was listed as a group that helped HIAS with refugee resettlement.

"Prosecution said Bowers had a deep and abiding prejudice and hated Jews, end of story. We know there is more than that. His statements tell us that," Clarke said.

Clarke also painted a portrait of Bowers’ life. He was born in Pittsburgh, the grandson of a steelworker, who later helped care for his family members. He was a quiet man who had a job delivering for Potomac Bakery and at times worked as a long-haul truck driver. Clarke said that he hadn't lived on his own since he was 44 years old, two years before the shooting took place.

She also said that he was a computer expert who spent too much time on the internet reading hateful messages, like the ones he on Gab.com that he liked, shared and posted himself at times. "In the months leading up to October 27, he spent a great deal of time alone on the internet, absorbing all kinds of vile extremist content," Clarke said.

Bowers had no criminal history and never previously pointed a gun at anyone, despite being a gun enthusiast, Clarke said. Bowers' family worried more that he would commit suicide than that he would commit a heinous act of violence. "So how did this man with no prior convictions, no prior arrest, come to the point of gathering up all his firearms and firepower and going into the Tree of Life Synagogue on that date and kill 11 well respected and well loved members of his community?" Clarke said. "You won't get a full picture of Mr. Bowers background in this phase of the case."

Instead, Clarke said, the defense will have few if any questions for witnesses who are called during the first phase of the trial. "There are going to be questions we can't answer now and may never provide a rational answer to," she said. "But in this courtroom we can at least do our best to uphold the rule of law, evidence, facts, what were Mr. Bowers’ motive and intent, and apply those facts to the law — that is all we really ask of you."

The court began hearing from its first witness just after 11 a.m., a dispatcher who spoke with a victim on the day of the shooting.

Lead prosecutor Soo Song spent about half an hour on her opening statements, guiding the jury through the early morning at the Tree of Life synagogue building and describing the individual victims. Song then detailed the moment when she said Robert Bowers entered and began, in her words, "hunting" down Jews, killing them in the middle of their house worship, tracking them into the basement, shooting them sometimes at such close range that the guns left a burn mark on the victim's skin.

The people who showed up on October 27, 2018, according to Song, were the most devout of Jewish worshipers and, she said, Bowers had left a long trail of hateful speech to his more than 300 followers on the Internet. And right before he went into the building, he posted again on his phone, "I'm going in."

After methodically describing the victims’ fear as they hid, detailing the pieces of flesh and hair that was splattered across the walls, she described how Bowers retreated back into the synagogue after exchanging gunfire with Pittsburgh Police officers outside. He then continued to shoot victims inside and then "ambushed" police officers in a classroom, firing an AR-15 and Glock 357, striking one officer multiple times and hitting a second in the arm. Then — after another exchange of gun fire — Bowers said he was hit and wanted to give himself up and wanted the officers to come get him. But the officers insisted that he crawl out with his hands up, where he was then asked who he was and why he did what he did.

"All Jews need to die. The Jews are killing our kids," Song said Bowers told the officers. "The Jews are children of Satan." The police officers who responded, she said, prevented Bowers from continuing on to terrorize the rest of the Jewish community in Squirrel Hill.

After describing the scene, Song then highlighted the many acts of heroism from survivors. There were people who called 911 and stayed on the phone, even as the shooting continued. There were leaders who helped people escape through back doors or find closets to hide in. There was the daughter who urged her mother to stay quiet, under the pews, so that they might avoid the shooter returning to shoot them again.

"You will hear testimony from these survivors — the terror, confusion and pain and also about their fight to stay alive, grace under pressure, survival instincts," Song said. But she added that two of the elderly survivors, including one who was about to enter the building before the shooting began, have died while waiting for the trial to begin, and one of those was a Holocaust survivor.

Song finished her opening statement by listing each of the victim's names.

Prosecutors and defense attorneys will have a chance to begin their opening arguments in a trial that is expected to last two months.

The court began looking for potential jurors in March, sending out and receiving back more than 1,100 questionnaires. The court then interviewed more than 200 people in-person, before whittling down the jury pool to 12 jurors and six alternates last week. Those 18 jurors will be given extensive instructions about their role as the trial gets underway this morning.

If Robert Bowers is found guilty, those jury members will have to decide whether or not he deserves the death penalty.

Read more about what to expect from the trial.