In Florida, police fatally shot a 73-year-old white woman during a police training exercise at the Punta Gorda Public Safety Complex on Wednesday. The officer who fired the gun thought it was loaded with blanks. Mary Knowlton was a retired librarian and a mother of two. She had volunteered to participate in a “shoot/don’t shoot” exercise as part of the citizen police academy. During the exercise, police officer Lee Coel shot the librarian in front of nearly three dozen other volunteers. Punta Gorda Police Chief Tom Lewis says live ammunition was not supposed to be in any of the guns used during the exercise. This is Mary Knowlton’s son, Steve Knowlton.

Steve Knowlton: “It was surreal. At first, we thought she just fell down. And then they turned her over, and that’s when they saw the bullet holes. Total pandemonium. They were just trying to do CPR and keep her alive.”

Officer Lee Coel has been placed on paid administrative leave.