Steve Bridges had just parked his pickup truck at the Texas Boot Factory when he saw a man — White, maybe 55 or 60 — step out of the car beside him and slip a gun under his belt. It was a Friday afternoon, three days after two cheerleaders opened the wrong car door in a supermarket parking lot nearby and were shot. Bridges, a 63-year-old contractor, had tried to picture how that could happen in Elgin, Tex., where eruptions of violence are rare. “It all goes back to the fear,” he said. “Why are cheerleaders getting shot for opening...
