By Bill Lawson
Stephens Media
A Salvation Army major, Philip Wise, 40, was shot and killed in front of his wife and three small children Christmas Eve as he walked into the organization’s North Little Rock headquarters.
North Little Rock police said Wise and his children were approached by two gunmen, both black men dressed in black, who demanded money and then fatally shot the officer.
Police said Wise had money from the day’s collections with him when he was attacked.
The incident happened around 4:15 p.m. Thursday as Wise, and his three children, ages 4, 6 and 8, were walking into the North Little Rock Community Center at 1505 W. 18th St., where the Salvation Army is also located.
A Pulaski County coroner said Wise was pronounced dead at the scene.
Maj. Cindy Wise, the man’s wife who also is a Salvation Army officer, was in the center and witnessed the shooting and called 911, telling police her husband had just dropped off bell-ringers from collecting money for the needy. She said her family was walking into the center at 18th and Main from a van used to pick up the bell-ringers from locations around the city.
Police said one of the two men, both of whom reportedly appeared to be in their teens or early 20s, pulled a gun, demanded money and then shot Wise.
Wise was supervisor of the North Little Rock, Maumelle and Sherwood operations and was well-known throughout the area. He had been with the Salvation Army for 16 years.
North Little Rock police are searching for the two black men said to be seen running from the scene.
Anyone with information is asked to call the North Little Rock police at 758-1234.
Wise, a native of Maryland, attended Salvation Army training from 1992 to 1994 in Atlanta. The Web site documenting his attendance quotes Ephesians 6:12: “We doth not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.”
Just last week, a Salvation Army kettle was stolen in a robbery at the Wal-Mart Supercenter in Sherwood, just a few miles north of where the shooting occurred Thursday.
