Yesterday the first indicators of a longer pattern of violence and anti-social behavior began to emerge. Today some of the space between those details begins to fill in. The gunman’s violent past includes: animal abuse, domestic violence and a history of stalking.
Texas gunman Devin Patrick Kelley, killed 26 people and wounded dozens more during his rampage at the Sutherland Springs First Baptist Church, and yesterday we began to discover his disturbing past including a year spent in military prison.
Today media reports are digging deeper and show the reason Kelley spent a year in prison was for abusing his wife and breaking the skull of his infant son. According to the Air Force, in 2012 while Kelley was stationed at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico in he was charged with “assault on his spouse and assault on their child.”
Retired Colonel Don Christensen, who was the lead Air Force prosecutor during the case, said:
“[Kelley] assaulted his stepson severely enough that he fractured his skull, and he also assaulted his wife. He plead to intentionally doing it.”
After Kelley spent a year in prison, he was kicked out of the military with a “bad conduct” discharge; similar to, but just a notch below, the more well-known dishonorable discharge.
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