MONMOUTH — Considering he took six bullets to the chest less than two months ago, Indiana State Trooper Jarrod Lents was in remarkable shape Wednesday.

“You don’t get shot six times from 5 feet away and just walk away,” Lents told a packed room on the top floor of Tex Tech Industries’ Monmouth headquarters Wednesday morning. “I’m extremely fortunate to not be dead, extremely fortunate to not be crippled. This is a career-ending injury, but it just boggles my mind that I survived.”

Lents credits his ballistics vest, manufactured by the Safariland Group using components made at the Maine factory, for saving his life.

Lents was honored by representatives and company officials from Safariland and Tex Tech for surviving after being shot multiple times at close range when he responded to reports of a robbery.

Lents told the group that he was working the day shift when he heard a confusing radio call. A gun store owner had dialed 911 on his cellphone as he was being robbed. Dispatchers couldn’t tell if the call was a robbery in progress, a domestic disturbance or exactly where the call was coming from. Lents drove to the address they gave, a gun shop in Montgomery, Ind.

He got out of his car just as dispatchers were reporting gunfire. He saw a truck backing down the driveway toward him and ordered the driver to stop, pulling his weapon.

The driver turned just as the truck pulled even with the trooper, and the driver pulled a 9 mm handgun.

Lents said he swatted the gun away as he ran for cover, firing blindly behind him as he went.

“I knew I was hit,” he said. “I wasn’t even past the front of the vehicle as I was hit, and I felt it instantly — and it hurt, bad.”

Lents made it to a shed, reloaded his weapon and was able to return fire, hitting his assailant in the head.

Lents was hit five or six times. One bullet grazed his arm, and he was bleeding considerably from that wound. None of the other bullets had pierced his armor, however. It hurt like he was hit by sledgehammer, but he would be OK.

“I didn’t know that I was OK until it was an hour later,” he said. “I remember they stripped me in the ambulance and the lady was telling me it was fine, that I was fine.”

Lents said his first thought was of his 3-year-old son.

“I owe you my life, and my son owes you his dad,” Lents said.

Ed Hinchey, technical specialist with Safariland, said Lents was the 1,856th person saved by the company’s body armor. Hinchey travels around the country, meeting with police officers and military personnel who have used the company’s equipment.

Wednesday’s event was the second time he’s visited the Monmouth manufacturer to congratulate personnel on saving a life.

John Stankiewicz, chief operations officer for Tex Tech, said the company makes several kinds of ballistic material used by police and the military. The patented fabric woven in Monmouth goes inside the nylon vest and stops the bullet. The company also makes the felt used for tennis balls.

staylor@sunjournal.com

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