Gov. Gen. David Johnston awarded Winnipeg native Lester Lehmann a Star of Courage on Friday, for his selfless actions in protecting 26 students from armed gunmen.
The students, all teenagers from Ste. Anne, Man., were visiting the Dominican Republic. Lehmann was looking after the apartments where the students were staying.
He spoke to CTV News Channel’s Merella Fernandez about what happened next:
Lehmann: Two intruders broke in at about one o’clock in the morning. I didn’t really realize they were there until I turned around and they both had guns pointed at me, and I thought my best chance was to just act crazy, to go crazy. I didn’t think they would shoot at me because I was unarmed.
After two or three minutes they shot several times and then they cornered me in my bedroom and basically stomped me on the ground and knocked me out -- or what they thought was knocked out. And then they left to hold up the students in the condos. I grabbed a baseball bat and went after them.
They had turned on the lights in one of the condos so they didn’t see me coming
Q: Were you thinking about what you were doing? Did you have a plan?
I guess I was just reacting. You don’t really get a chance to think and everything is going so quickly. The one person was just coming out of the condo as I came around the corner, and I was able to strike him. But the second person came out and ended up putting 10 shots into me. It didn’t take me long to realize that I was OK. The majority of the shots had just passed through me, and hadn’t hit anything. There was only four of them that did any amount of damage -- there was a couple in my knee and one that broke an arm bone. After he shot me he grabbed his unconscious buddy and dragged him off, so I was no longer in any danger. And when I looked around, I realized that I wasn’t hurt that badly. I had holes all over me, but I knew right away that I would be OK.
Q: How long did it take you to recover?
Well, I still walk with a bit of a limp. And my left hand still doesn’t work perfectly. So I guess I’m still recovering. But it’s nothing serious. It’s just sort of a reminder of that day.
Q: Did you ever have any combat training?
No. It was just a reaction. I was responsible for these young kids. Most of them were 16-, 17-year-old teenage girls from Ste. Anne, Manitoba, and I had to step up.
I basically just did something completely irrational, and the universe or fate gave me a pass on it.
