A Rhode Island dad, hailed for his quick response during a violent incident at a high school hockey game, humbly stated he doesn’t see himself as a hero.
Michael Black was in attendance at the David M Lynch Arena in Pawtucket on Monday afternoon when Robert Dorgan, 56, who also went by the name ‘Roberta Esposito,’ opened fire, tragically killing his son and ex-wife.
The gunman also critically injured his ex-wife’s parents and a family friend in the attack before turning the gun on himself.
Disturbing video footage captured the moment when Dorgan slowly navigated through the bleachers, unleashing a dozen shots.
The video showed Dorgan raising his arm to fire multiple shots into one victim’s back, until a courageous bystander intervened, attempting to restrain him amidst the chaos.
Pawtucket Police Chief Tina Goncalves remarked on Monday night that the quick-thinking good Samaritan likely saved many lives and helped bring the tragic event to a rapid conclusion.
The following day, Black told WJAR how he leaped over seats to grab Dorgan’s pistol – preventing him from firing any further shots – before tackling the gunman to the ground.
Reflecting on his decision to act, Black told the network how there were just about 10 minutes left in the first period of the match between two high school co-op teams when he heard a popping noise.
‘As I was watching the game, I heard a “pop, pop.” And I thought they were balloons – I thought they were big balloons,’ the retired businessman recounted.
‘And the noise was right in front of me. I looked and I saw, and heard, another “pop” and recognized there wasn’t any balloons there and thought that something was wrong.’
Michael Black described how he leaped into action to wrestle a gun from Robert Dorgan, 56, moments after he opened fire on his family members
Dorgan (pictured) was seen in footage from the shooting being grabbed from behind by a brave witness who tried to detain him as others fled the melee on Monday
At that point, Black said he started to look around – when he noticed a man pointing a pistol at people in the second row.
‘As soon as I saw the pistol, my wife was sitting next to me with some friends and we didn’t even look at each other and I just said, “run, run.”‘
Meanwhile, Black said he ‘kind of waited and as soon as I saw a clear path, I got on the third level step and he was on the one and a half, and I just jumped across and went for the gun. I wanted to grab the gun.
‘And what happened was, my hand got caught in the sliding chamber and he shot, and my hand got caught, and I was holding him down with my body.’
With his hand stuck in the chamber, Black said, Dorgan could not fire any more shots.
‘He was trying to press the trigger and the gun wasn’t working because my hand was in the way,’ he explained.
Eventually, Black said, the shooter shoved him and rolled him onto the bleachers, before several others choked Dorgan, who Black said wound up falling right below him.
‘So literally I’m looking down and he’s looking up and we were staring right at each other. And at that point in time, I wanted to come down and put my knee or something to put it on his body to try to hold them down.’
But that is when, Black said, Dorgan pulled out a second pistol ‘and put it [in] his mouth and shot himself.’
Dorgan killed his son, Aidan, 23 (left) and ex-wife, Rhonda, 52
The shooting came as two high school hockey teams faced off against one another in a ‘Senior Night’ match at the Dennis M Lynch Arena in Pawtucket, Rhode Island on Monday afternoon
Black told WCVB he was left with a hand injury and a burn to his face from an ejected shell casing.
He was then brought to a local hospital, where he said a nurse asked him how he was doing as her eyes started welling up with tears – prompting him to start to tear up as well.
‘It was just a moment that helped,’ Black said. ‘I was human again.’
When he was asked about what others called as his life-saving actions, Black said he did not consider himself a hero.
‘When I saw what the police did, fire, paramedics at the hospital last night, I have such a high-level appreciation of what they do every day,’ he said.
‘And as I was sitting at the hospital last night, I recognize, you know, I have heroes in my life, but these should be our heroes.’
Still, he said a phone call he received from a Pawtucket police officer changed his perspective ‘a little bit.’
‘He said, “We were interviewing the daughter yesterday and she has a belief on what happened. As the shooter was coming down, he was shooting one person, the next, the next. And she said he was looking at me, I was going to be next,”‘ Black recounted.
Shortly after the horror shooting, the daughter of the transgender shooter broke down in tears as she left a police station, telling reporters he was ‘very sick’
Livestreamed footage of the game showed the high school hockey players racing across the ice to flee following the sound of gunshots
‘And she told the police officer, “Until this guy in a black jacket tackled him and took the gun away, I’m sure he would have killed me.”‘
Hours after the shooting, a woman claiming to be Dorgan’s daughter said he ‘has mental health issues.’
‘He shot my family, and he’s dead now,’ she told WCVB.
‘If you have a loved one who you think is sick, trust your gut,’ the woman, whose identity could not be confirmed by the Daily Mail, added.
The fatal shooting took the lives of 23-year-old Aidan Dorgan along with his mother, Rhonda, 52.
It came as her youngest son, Colin Dorgan, 17, was competing on the ice just several feet away.
Colin, captain of the Blackstone Valley Schools’ hockey team, could be seen skating backwards as shots rang out in the rink.
The standout defenseman, wearing his No. 17 jersey, abruptly turned his head towards the source of the gunfire before rushing off the ice, while those on the sidelines either ducked down or sprinted for safety.
Some others on the bench also leapt over the side of the rink and raced to the locker rooms, as spectators were heard crying and screaming in the distance.
A motive for the shooting remains unclear, but police said it stemmed from a family dispute. Dorgan is pictured showing off a Nazi-inspired tattoo
It is unclear how close Dorgan was with his children. He posted this photo of himself with Aidan and Colin in July 2023
A motive for the shooting remained unclear on Tuesday, but Police Chief Goncalves said it stemmed from a family dispute.
Court records show Dorgan’s gender identity had been a source of contention in the family, with Rhonda citing his ‘gender reassignment surgery, narcissistic and personality disorder traits’ as grounds for divorce in 2020.
Those reasons were later crossed out and replaced with ‘irreconcilable differences which have caused the immediate breakdown of the marriage’. Their divorce was finalized in 2021.
After Dorgan underwent gender reassignment surgery in early 2020, he also claimed that his father-in-law wanted him kicked out of the house and threatened to ‘have him murdered by an Asian street gang if he did not move out of the residence’, according to police records.
Dorgan, who at the time told police he had been living at the home for seven years, also claimed his father-in-law told him: ‘There’s no goddam [sic] way a tranny is going to stay in my house,’ the documents read.
The father-in-law was charged with intimidation of witnesses and victims of crimes and obstruction of the judicial system, but prosecutors later dismissed the charges.
In more recent years, Dorgan has spread antisemitic and racist rhetoric on social media, where he would share his support for ‘white power.’
The gunman, who donned a Nazi tattoo, even posted an anti-Asian slur as he replied to a video praising Adolf Hitler just one day before the fatal shooting.
That same day, Dorgan also threatened to go ‘BESERK.’
