A police firearms officer has told a jury he thought he was going to die when a man accused of plotting to carry out a series of “revenge” attacks ran towards him pointing a gun.
The officer, identified only by the codename L4, became emotional as he described drawing his own gun and shooting Reed Wischhusen, who had allegedly stockpiled an armoury and plotted attacks on his former primary school, his workplace and a police headquarters.
Giving evidence from behind a screen at Bristol crown court, L4 said Wischhusen was shouting: “I want to die!” as he charged at him.
Asked by the prosecuting barrister Jonathan Rees KC what he was thinking, there was a long pause before he replied: “I thought I was going to die.”
Police had gone to the run-down house that Wischhusen, a warehouse worker, shared with his father in the village of Wick St Lawrence, near Weston-super-Mare in November 2022, after receiving a tipoff he had weapons.
When they looked into his bedroom, they saw a handgun, rifles, body armour and a silencer. They went back downstairs, planning to call in backup to carry out a full search.
Wischhusen, 32, excused himself to use the upstairs bathroom. Officers heard a gun being cocked and a single shot being fired. L4, an Avon and Somerset officer, said: “It sounded like a gun shot or an explosion.”
L4’s colleague, another firearms officer who had accompanied Wischhusen upstairs, came running back down calling out: “Withdraw!”
L4 told the court: “After a short amount of time – it’s so quick – he [Wischhusen] came to the top of the stairs. He had a handgun pointing directly at me.
“I can recall saying things like drop the gun, put the gun down. He rushed down the stairs towards me.”
Rees asked where the gun was pointed. L4 replied: “Directly towards me.” He added: “It was so quick … I fired two shots.”
Wischhusen slumped to the floor having been shot in the torso and was handcuffed. L4 said he and his colleagues gave Wischhusen first aid “to save his life”. They decided to remove the handcuffs to remove his jacket so his wounds could be treated.
“At one point he reached for the gun, which was near to his feet,” said L4. “One of my colleagues stopped him. He kept resisting.”
An unarmed neighbourhood police officer who was also there, codenamed N8, described the two firearms officers going back into the house after initially withdrawing outside. “As they stepped back in, I didn’t know if they were going to come out or if he [Wischhusen] was going to come out,” he said. “It was difficult.”
Asked about the moment the shots were fired, N8 told the court: “It was a bit surreal to be honest. You never expect to be in that situation.”
Speaking of the moment Wischhusen allegedly reached out for his gun after his handcuffs were removed, N8 said: “His right arm went out. It looked as if he was trying to grab the pistol. I pushed the gun away.”
Wischhusen’s alleged targets included former classmates who he believed had bullied him, colleagues who he thought laughed at him, and Avon and Somerset police officers after the force refused him a firearms licence, the court was told. He was allegedly fascinated with mass killings in the UK and the US.
Wischhusen, who spent four months in hospital recovering from his injuries, denies five firearms and explosives offences. The trial continues.
