At about 1:15 am on August 19, 1989, Mark MacPhail, an off-duty police officer who was working as a security guard at the Burger King, attempted to intervene in the pistol-whipping of Young at the parking lot. MacPhail was shot twice: once through the heart and once in the face. He did not draw his gun. Bullets and shell casings which were determined to have come from a .38-caliber pistol were retrieved from the crime scene. Witnesses to the shooting agreed that a man in a white shirt had struck Young and then shot MacPhail.