Texas Church Shooting: 3K Attend Funeral Service For Slain Family

SUTHERLAND SPRINGS, TX — A funeral service is under way for eight members of one family killed in a mass shooting at the small First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs and about 3,000 mourners were attended with hundreds more turned away.

Church member John Holcombe survived the massacre and invited the public to the service on Wednesday for his pregnant wife, three of her children, his parents, a brother and a toddler niece. The funeral is taking place at an event center in Floresville, about 12 miles from the site of the shooting.

A string of limousines carrying victims' families accompanied the black and white hearses to the event center. Fire marshals and sheriff's deputies stood by as hundreds of others waited in line to enter the service, some in funeral attire and others in casual clothes.

News reporters were barred from entering and were being held in a pen with two trucks obscuring the view inside.

The dead will be buried privately on an unspecified date.

Holcombe managed audio-visual operations at the back of the church and escaped with minor injuries. His 7-year-old step-daughter Evelyn also fled.

Devin Patrick Kelley shot and killed 25 people at the church on Nov. 5. Authorities have put the official toll at 26, because Holcombe's wife, Crystal Holcombe, was pregnant.

Kelley died of what appeared to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Photo credit: Eric Gay/Associated Press