A North Carolina High School Basketball Coach Died In An "Old Western Shootout" With The Cartel After Trying To Knock Off One Of Their Stash Houses

(NBC) -  A high school basketball coach in Union County was killed in a shootout with a Mexican drug cartel in Alamance County, North Carolina, last week, deputies said. 

According to the Alamance County Sheriff’s Office, Barney Harris died on Thursday, April 8 in a shootout with a drug cartel. Investigators said Harris and another person went to a stash house in Alamance County last week to steal money and drugs from the cartel.

Harris and his partner Steven Alexander Stewart Jr., who was identified as his brother-in-law, then killed a drug runner for the cartel before a shootout started. Harris was shot and killed during the gunfire. Harris was found inside the house shot multiple times. Investigators said Harris was wearing a bulletproof vest that did not protect him from the ammunition used in the shooting.

Stewart was arrested and is charged with first-degree murder and first-degree burglary. 

Detectives said multiple types of firearms were used during the shootout and Johnson described the scene "like an old western shootout." Other mobile homes in the area were struck by bullets. No one at any other home was injured during the shootout.

Fucking WILD. 

I've been re-reading this story for an hour trying to think of anything else to say and I cannot because I am stunned. I don't get taken aback by much on the internet anymore, but a high school coach's secret life being unveiled postmortem via trailer park shootout with the Cartel is the type of shit that you watch in a movie and think, "Eh, feels a bit farfetched." There's nothing really to joke about here, a man died and a community is now trying to piece together the aftermath of finding out something like this could happen in their own backyard. I hate repeating myself but, "Fucking wild," remains the only thought my brain can conjure when thinking about the layers of this story.