UVA shooting survivor Mike Hollins recounts harrowing events, sends message to alleged shooter
The events on the University of Virginia‘s campus on Sunday, November 14 sent shockwaves across the country and left a dark cloud hanging over the heads of many in the world of sports and beyond, when Virginia football players Devin Chandler, D’Sean Perry, and Lavel Davis were all tragically shot and killed on a charter bus that was on the way back to Virginia’s campus following a school trip.
Running back Mike Hollins was one of two victims injured in the shooting that survived, and he recently shared the events of that day on Good Morning America in a sit-down interview with Michael Strahan.
“Once I got up and the bus was stopping was when the gunshots started ringing out. In that moment I knew we had to get off that bus because it could get a lot worse. Me and another teammate were the only two to get off the bus and I turned back and looked over my shoulder and I realize we’re the only two running. I didn’t really think much in that moment, it was just literally an instinct and a reaction to go back,” Hollins said.
Hollins told Strahan that when he went back on the bus, he was met by the shooter as he was making his way up the bus steps.
“It was just so close and I felt so hopeless and so powerless in that moment,” Hollins said, as he was asked if the shooter said anything to him. “Nothing at all, we locked eyes and that was it. It was just a cold look, it was a, I don’t know, a numb look and in that moment I just dropped everything and took off running. I felt him hit me in my back, but I knew I wasn’t going down without a fight and I found a pre-med student and that was God again. She was there to help me, she kept me calm, kept my breathing under control, was checking my pulse until the ambulance came.”
Virginia student and former walk-on student-athlete Chris Jones was taken into custody as the culprit of the shooting, and now faces three counts of second-degree murder and three counts of using a handgun in the commission of a felony, along with counts of malicious wounding, each accompanied by a firearm charge.
Hollins said he did not know Jones, and that he seemed normal when they first got on the bus, as he was not able to find out the news of his fallen teammates until days after recovering from his own injuries from the shooting.
“I found out two days later, because I went straight to surgery, because I think I got hit in the small intestine, the kidney, and they were trying to see if it damaged my bladder. By the grace of God it missed my spine by I think two centimeters or something like that,” Hollins said. “I’ve never cried like that before, I mean I lost a brother that day. I loved Lavel with all my heart, loved Devin with all my heart, but D’Sean it was different with him. Man that was my brother, so it was tragic hearing that he was gone.”
Strahan asked Hollins if he had a message for the shooter, which he replied saying, “I just would love to ask if he knew the magnitude of his actions in the moment, like if he ever thought how many people would be affected for the rest of their lives.”
Hollins concluded by speaking on how the tragic events have changed him, as he looks to keep the legacy of his fallen teammates alive through everything he does.
“I’ve never been as, like I said, vulnerable or emotional. But now it’s just like I don’t really care, I can’t control it, I’m not afraid to tell my friends or my teammates I love you, looking forward to seeing you again, and really meaning it now. I’m doing it for my brothers I lost. I’m still doing it for the people I love, for the people that were on that bus and everything I do from here on will be in their name, in their light. And I just wanna do as much as I can to keep their flame lit,” Hollins said.