FORT STEWART, GA — First, Sgt. Aaron Turner saw the hoodie. Then the boots. Then his eyes followed the arm carrying a weapon.
“That’s when I started taking action,” Turner told reporters Thursday, quietly recounting how a typical, warm Georgia day turned to tragedy.
Late in the morning on Aug. 6, 2025, a U.S. Army sergeant armed with a personal weapon started shooting at Fort Stewart, wounding five soldiers. More than a year later, eight soldiers stood at the same base to be honored for stopping the violence.
Acting Secretary of the Army Adam Telle and Vice Chief of Staff of the Army Gen. Christopher LaNeve presented awards to eight of the soldiers who subdued the shooter and rendered first aid to the five wounded victims.
Recalling that fateful day under an unseasonably sweltering November sun nearly 15 months later, Turner said before the gunfire began, he had recognized the shooter as a fellow soldier — someone he knew. Turner said he tried to talk down to the assailant, “telling him that it’s not worth it.” The gunman did not heed Turner’s advice and walked past him. It was then, the sergeant said, that he realized his words could not prevent tragedy.
Before Turner could put his plan into action, another soldier rushed the assailant from behind, pulling the hoodie down over his eyes and yanking his shoulders back. Turner said he seized the chance to take a knee and disarm the shooter, then cleared the gun of ammunition and helped to detain him until military police arrived.
Officials awarded the Soldier’s Medal — the Army’s highest award for heroism not involving combat with an enemy — to Turner and Sgt. Michael Boron for physically restraining the shooter until military police arrived, preventing him from continuing to attack additional victims. Turner, an automated logistical non-commissioned officer, and Boron, a combat medic and evacuation squad leader, are both assigned to the 2nd Armored Brigade Combat Team at Fort Stewart, Georgia.
Telle and LaNeve recognized the remaining six awardees with the Meritorious Service Medal for shielding others and helping injured victims. The recipients — Capt. Shailesh Nakarmi, 1st Lt. Kendarious Nixon, Sgt. 1st Class Luis Garza, Staff Sgt. Jalen Davis, Staff Sgt. Raudy Javier and Spc. Gavin Brebnor — vary in occupational specialties ranging from logistics officers to heavy vehicle drivers to an ammunition stock control specialist.
Some of the new awardees have since been stationed elsewhere, but all returned for the presentation.
“We would all like to think that we’d do exactly what sergeants Turner and Boron did. We all like to think that, but they actually did [it],” Telle told the crowd gathered in front of the 3rd Infantry Division’s Headquarters for the ceremony. “It was heroic, and because of their speed, their discipline and their courage — no hesitation — not a single life was lost.”
A day after the shooting, then-Army Secretary Dan Driscoll presented Meritorious Service Medals to five separate soldiers and Turner for their actions during the shooting. The Army upgraded Turner’s award to the Soldier’s Medal.
The assailant, identified as Quornelius S. Radford, was a former automated logistics sergeant assigned to the base. On Aug. 6, 2025, Radford drove to Fort Stewart with a loaded personal firearm after an argument with his fiancée. Afraid he was suicidal, Radford’s fiancée followed him onto base and approached the soldier in the parking lot. Radford shot him before rushing inside his unit’s building complex and shooting four more people.
This June, Radford confessed to the attack and was found guilty of attempted murder by a military judge. He received six life sentences, to be served at the United States Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. According to the Army, all of his victims testified in favor of the maximum sentence.
Officials were keen to keep the ceremony focused on the awardees and not the shooter and Radford’s name was not once uttered during the ceremony. But for Davis, who hurried other soldiers out of harm’s way when Radford’s rampage began, the violence is not easy to forget.
“It’s definitely something that I think will stay with me for the rest of my life,” he said soberly, calling the event “traumatic” — especially because the assailant was a fellow soldier in his unit and someone he knew.
Lt. Col. Carlos Santos, the 703 Brigade Support Battalion Commander, who commanded the unit during the shooting, expressed pride in how the unit has come together since last August, crediting family readiness groups for pulling together support for the loved ones of injured soldiers. He said the unit had surged chaplains and given soldiers the opportunity for behavioral healthcare. Still, the day impacted him.
“It affected me as well, from the battalion commander on down,” he said, adding, “we all need to recover.”
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