KPD said the 15-year-old victim was shot while visiting a friend on Dec. 23 when his friend was “handling a firearm and accidentally discharged it”.
KILLEEN, Texas — A Central Texas teen is recovering at home after being shot on Dec. 23, 2023.
A spokesperson for the Killeen Police Department said the teen was visiting a friend in the 4000 block of Thunder Creek Drive when his friend was “handling a firearm and accidentally discharged it, wounding the victim”. KPD is not able to provide any other information on the investigation as there are two juveniles involved.
Dorneth Browne-Jackson identified the victim to 6 News as her 15-year-old grandson. She said after more than three weeks, he is slowly starting to feel better. Browne-Jackson said it’s been hard for her and the rest of the family to watch him work through the trauma, but they are feeling blessed that he is still with them.
“[His dad] thought he wasn’t gonna make it,” Browne-Jackson said. “He was bleeding so much. He was naked lying on a gurney, just didn’t look promising. They couldn’t bring his blood pressure up. They were giving him blood, but he was bleeding it out. So it wasn’t looking promising.”
The 15-year-old has had two surgeries so far, many doctor visits, different medications including blood thinners and a life adjustment.
“He says that I don’t believe that somebody would look at me and shoot me, so it has to be an accident,” Browne-Jackson recalled her grandson saying. “He wakes from his sleep saying that I got shot, I got shot, that tells me that he’s still going through the trauma. He cries, he gets emotional, he shuts down because it was just too much.”
Browne-Jackson said her grandson is super active and has a passion for basketball. He was recently looking forward to the upcoming season until the shooting happened.
“We were told that it was a drive-by and then it ended up being something else,” Browne-Jackson explained. “I don’t know how the kid got the gun, but it was a gun that he had that was able to do this to my grandson.”
Browne-Jackson said their family feels defeated waiting on KPD to take action on the case, as well as provide updates to them.
“Feel like we’re not a part of the community, like my grandson is not important,” Browne-Jackson said. “The reason why I’m feeling that KPD is okay with accepting this and making it the norm is because I had to be the one to reach out to them. I had to be the one that kept calling and leaving voicemails and messages, and then their response was ‘We have 13,000 cases’. So, to me, it’s like this is not important.”
Since her grandson became another victim of gun safety issues and gun violence, Browne-Jackson is advocating for change and accountability.
“Gun violence now has become so normalized that it will touch every family, if it has not yet touched every family in America, it will,” Browne-Jackson added. “We need better laws, better laws, better things put in place for guns and children, adolescents and adults.”
KPD offers free gun locks for residents. Visit the police headquarters if you would like to take advantage of the resource.
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