On November 5, 2009, Nidal Hasan — then an Army major and psychiatrist — walked into the Soldier Readiness Processing Center at Fort Hood, Texas, where soldiers were going through medical checks before deploying. Hasan shouted "Allahu Akbar" and opened fire with a handgun. He killed 13 people and wounded 32 others.
Staff Sgt. Alonzo Lunsford, a medic working there that day, was shot seven times — including in the head and in the back. He played dead, crawled to cover, and later escaped. He heard 21-year-old pregnant Pvt. Francheska Velez screaming as she was shot and killed. Lunsford survived, retired from the Army in 2013, and has lived with the physical and mental scars ever since.
Hasan was convicted in 2013 of 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted premeditated murder. He was sentenced to death and has sat on military death row for more than a decade. After the full appeals process — including the Supreme Court declining to review the case in March 2025 — President Trump approved the death sentence on October 2, 2026. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth recommended a firing squad. The Army set the date: December 3, 2026, at 1 p.m. Central Time, at Fort Hood itself — the same place the attack happened. It would be the first U.S. military execution since 1961 and the first by firing squad since World War II.
Lunsford has said he plans to be there in person. He wants Hasan to look him in the eyes before the trigger is pulled. "I want him to know he failed. I'm still here." He supports the firing squad because he believes it is befitting of what Hasan did — other methods would be too easy by comparison.
At the same time, Lunsford has drawn a hard line against turning the execution into entertainment. "I don't want this to be viewed upon as a spectacle, like a pay-per-view event, or like going to a basketball tournament," he said. He does not think the general public — especially children — should be watching. Hegseth announced the execution would be public and the Pentagon confirmed livestream plans, but President Trump said on October 9 that a final decision on the broadcast is still being made.
Lunsford has also said that, as a Christian, he has personally forgiven Hasan — but that forgiveness does not mean he wants a lighter punishment, and it does not take away his sympathy for the victims and survivors who want closure.
In short: a man who was nearly killed while trying to help other soldiers wants to be present when the person who shot him and killed 13 others is executed at the same location — so the killer has to face one of the people he failed to kill. That is the core of what Lunsford has been telling interviewers, and on December 3, he intends to be standing there when it happens.
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