SEBRING, Fla. — For 15 years, Trudy Benton worked at the SunTrust Bank on U.S. 27 in Sebring.
“It’s a sisterhood,” said Benton of the mostly female staff of bank tellers. “Everybody had everybody’s back. Everyone pitched in.”
She left to start her own financial advising firm but still had an account and kept in close touch with her SunTrust family.
“I do most of my [banking] on the internet, but I would always save a check or two just so I could go in and say 'hi' to the girls,” said Benton.
But on Wednesday, everything changed.
“Just deputy after deputy after deputy, one after the other,” said Benton as she pointed towards U.S. 27 where the emergency vehicles were flying by following the shooting.
Benton’s office is just a half mile north of the bank branch where many of her friends still worked.
“We could hear the helicopters, the news helicopters, the medivac,” recalls Benton.
Then came the news no one was prepared for -- four female employees gunned down along with a customer in what so far seems to be a random act of evil.
“It’s unprecedented,” said Benton. “I’ve never expected anything like this. It’s a nightmare.”
Benton is mourning the loss of dear friends, and while she refuses to imagine the terror inflicted on those inside, deep down she already knows.
In 2008, she was held up at gunpoint while working the front lobby at SunTrust.
“I had a 3-year-old son. [I’m thinking] 'I’m going to die. Who is going to raise my 3-year-old son?' And everyone in there was a mother as well and the first thing you do is you think about your family.”
No one was hurt in the holdup, making what happened to her friends Wednesday seem so unfair.
“These women are unforgettable,” said Benton. “They’re not ordinary women. Their memories will go on strong forever.”
After her incident, Benton began coordinating special crisis training at a local church specifically for women working in banks.
Now she’s having to make extra room for those who are terrified something similar could happen again.
“If we have to cram every inch of that church hall to keep women safe, if we can save a woman by teaching someone to protect themselves, I know Marisol (Lopez) and the others would want women to be protected,” said Benton, who acknowledges all the training in the world might not have prevented what happened here in Sebring.
That being said, she says the rule book on how tellers are trained to “simply comply” needs to change.
She says if even one woman is saved, the lives of her former co-workers won’t be lost in vain.
►Make it easy to keep up-to-date with more stories like this. Download the 10 News app now.
Have a news tip? Email tips@wtsp.com, visit our Facebook page or Twitter feed.