DUNCANVILLE, Texas — LaQuitha Ned sat in the front foyer of her home Wednesday evening surrounded by family. The only person missing was her husband, Brandon Keith Ned. His family and friends call him “Ronnie”.
“I don’t understand why this happened,” Ned said. On Monday morning, just after 8:30 a. m.
, Brandon Ned walked into the Duncanville Fieldhouse with a gun. Nearly 250 kids were in the facility attending summer camp. Duncanville police said he fired one shot after interacting with a staff member, then fired another shot into classroom filled with children after he wasn’t able to get into the room because the door was locked.
Police said officers responded to the facility two minutes after they were called. They said they exchanged gunfire with Ned in the gym of the facility and ultimately shot and killed him. “My husband was bipolar,” LaQuitha Ned said.
“He was having an episode. He has an episode every three years, but he’s never hurt anyone. ” Ned said she spoke to her husband just minutes before he entered the fieldhouse.
She said they spoke on FaceTime, and he was planning to come home after he finished riding with his friend to drop her kids off at the the camp. Ned said she believes her husband went into the facility because his friend was taking too long, and he wanted to know where she was. Brandon Ned’s brother, who wanted to be called “Ned,” said he was told the woman his brother rode to the camp with asked someone for help because was concerned for him due to his behavior.
“I feel like if he’d went in to hurt someone, someone would’ve been hurt,” LaQuitha Ned said. “No one was hurt except my husband. ” Brandon Ned pled guilty to intoxication manslaughter and spent two years in prison in 2011.
That incident, under the law, prohibits him from owning a gun. “I didn’t know he had the gun at that time,” LaQuitha Ned said. “He’s not supposed to own a gun.
I own a gun. It stays in a lock box with the key hidden. ” LaQuitha Ned said the gun her husband used on Monday belonged to her.
She also said that Ned’s bipolar episodes caused him to be paranoid. “He’d been acting paranoid like feeling like he needed to protect his family,” she said. Ned’s family said they believe he is being painted as a “terrorist” because of heightened sensitivity following the tragedy in Uvalde.
They also said they don’t believe it’s fair for the incident in 2011, a drunk driving crash that killed two of Ned’s relatives, to be attached to what happened Monday. “I’m so glad nobody was hurt at the fieldhouse, but I wish they would have allowed my husband to come back home to me so that I could get him some help,” LaQuitha Ned said. Following the incident Monday morning, Duncanville Mayor Barry Gordon told WFAA that officers had just recently undergone active shooter training.
“Our officers did not hesitate,” Gordon said. “They did what they were trained to do and saved lives. ” LaQuitha Ned and her family said they want to see body camera and surveillance footage so they can get the full picture of what happened that day.
“I want to apologize to everyone who was at the fieldhouse. To the parents…everyone involved,” Ned’s brother said. “I just want everyone to know that’s not who he was.
“.
From: wfaa
URL: https://www.wfaa.com/article/news/local/family-of-man-duncanville-summer-camp-says-he-was-bipolar/287-a51aedc6-aa67-48fb-9d7d-b00671281aae
