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The Oregon man who fatally shot a teenage gunman to end a deadly rampage at an elementary school<\/a> last week says he was the children’s \u201clast line of defense\u201d and that he regrets not arriving soon enough to save them all.<\/p>\n Kaylub Giamanco, whose two daughters attend Silver Rail Elementary,<\/a> where the Oct. 15 attack occurred, said he feels like he failed the families of those who died.<\/p>\n \u201cI want to apologize for not saving their babies, that\u2019s probably the biggest thing for me right now,\u201d Giamanco told Oregon Public Broadcasting in an interview<\/a> published Friday. \u201cThe gratitude for saving people\u2019s children is awesome. But there were ones that I didn\u2019t save.\u201d<\/p>\n Three children \u2014 ages 5, 8 and 11 \u2014 and a teacher were killed at the school in Bend, Oregon, last week when a former student there, 16-year-old Griffin J. John II, blasted his way through locked doors with a shotgun and attacked a special needs classroom. Another student was critically injured and a teacher was injured and hospitalized. <\/p>\n Police say another teacher threw her phone at the attacker and wrestled with him before Giamanco shot and killed him after following the gunman into the building. <\/p>\n Giamanco said he dropped off his daughters at the school that morning before driving to work. A few hours later, the 36-year-old carpenter was passing the school again as he was heading home for lunch. <\/p>\n He said he spotted someone wearing black and carrying a long gun fire shots into a pickup truck and at a person mowing the school’s lawn before the shooter climbed a fence and headed toward the school building. <\/p>\n Giamanco said \u201cpanic fled into my brain.\u201d He grabbed a .40-caliber handgun from his truck’s center console and went after the gunman as he dialed 911. He asked the dispatcher to send help before hanging up his phone. <\/p>\n \u201cI said ‘I\u2019m sorry I have to go in. People are going to die,’\u201d Giamanco said in the interview.<\/p>\n As he got closer to the building, Giamanco said, he lay on his stomach and used his elbows to crawl across the ground. <\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s when I started hearing children pleading for their lives,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd then I started hearing gunfire and I just started army crawling faster and faster. And I told myself: ‘This is probably the last thing that I\u2019m ever going to do.’\u201d<\/p>\n Giamanco said he entered the school through a window that had been shot out. Peeking into a nearby classroom, he saw a teacher grappling with the shooter. He said he faced them both in profile, giving him an open shot. <\/p>\n \u201cI felt like I was the last line of defense between him and the rest of the children,\u201d Giamanco said.<\/p>\n He swung the door open, stepped into the room and fired his gun. <\/p>\n Both the gunman and the teacher dropped to the floor. The teacher bolted from the room as the shooter reached for his shotgun.<\/p>\n \u201cHe was scrambling for his weapon,\u201d Giamanco said. \u201cI looked at him and I shot him two more times to make sure that he couldn\u2019t move, because I was afraid of him shooting anybody else.\u201d<\/p>\n Police have said Giamanco was carrying his gun legally in his truck and have credited him and the unarmed teacher who confronted the gunman with saving lives. A day after the shootings, President Donald Trump said that Giamanco was a \u201cgreat hero\u201d who \u201ctook care of business.\u201d<\/p>\n