On the night of Sunday, Apr. 16, a man wanted in connection with a double-murder shot himself as police surrounded the Greyhound bus he was traveling on as it pulled into South Station. Tufts freshman Lilly Riber, who was a passenger on the same bus, was unharmed in the incident.
According to the Boston Globe, the man, Stephen A. Marshall, 20, of Nova Scotia, Canada, was suspected in the killings of two registered Maine sex offenders.
Police in pursuit of Marshall stopped the Greyhound bus immediately outside of South Station. As the police boarded the bus, Marshall shot himself in the head.
The situation did not appear as clear-cut for Riber, who was returning from visiting a friend at Colby College in Waterville, Maine. (Riber is also a staff writer for the Daily's news department.)
"It was my first time taking the bus," she said. "We were literally feet away from South Station."
According to Riber, it had been a long trip; normally over four hours, it had already been extended after the original bus had broken down and passengers were left standing on the side of the highway for an hour while waiting for a new bus.
The bus didn't arrive in Boston until almost 8 p.m., six hours after it had left Waterville. The shooting incident took place as Riber was gathering her belongings to get off the bus.
"I looked out the window and saw all these police cars with their lights flashing," she said. "They were blocking the road. I saw them running around chasing something, they had their guns out."
Things after that happened very quickly. "All of a sudden, we heard a gunshot," she said.
"The guy next to me told me to get down. I was so scared, I was under the seat, I couldn't really see anything," she said.
Confusion ensued, she said. "We heard people yelling, 'Someone's been shot in the head' and 'We have an emergency.' No one knew what to do."
As people shouted back and forth about whether the man shot had a pulse, "I never lifted up my head, she said. "We didn't know where [the shot] came from."
Riber heard "a voice [telling us] to put our hands in the air, and stay where we are."
Still hunkered down under the seat, Riber didn't know that the police were beginning to stake out the bus: "I thought the bus was being hijacked."
The police then directed everyone to get off the bus, and stand outside on the highway.
"No one knew what happened," she said. "We didn't know if shot was fired inside or outside. [Some] people thought police had shot and missed. Everyone was totally panicked. We didn't find out it was a suicide until much later."
The passengers were placed in a city bus and driven to the police station for questioning.
"We still didn't know what happened," Riber said. "A lady was standing there covered in blood."
While Marshall was sitting at the back of the bus, Riber was sitting near the center. "The people sitting behind me had to walk past [the dead man]," she said. "He was on there before me, he got on at the very first stop. I on got on later at Waterville."
After a long period of questioning, Riber and the other bus riders were finally released at approximately 1 a.m., after the police ensured that each person had a ride home.
Asked whether she would consider taking another bus in the future, Riber was doubtful. "No, I will never really take the bus again," Riber said. "I realize it was freak situation not indicative of Greyhound buses, but it was really, really horrible."
It is unclear why the police decided to stop the bus before it reached South Station, potentially endangering passengers.
According to the Boston Globe, MBTA spokesman Lieutenant Detective Mark Gillespie said police "made a very good decision preventing the bus from entering the terminal, where there were thousands of holiday travelers." Calls seeking comment on the matter from the MBTA and the Massachusetts State Police were not returned.
