A 24-year-old woman was shot and killed by her teenage husband inside an Alabama hospital shortly after she gave birth to their first child. The horrifying shooting was carried out on Sunday night at Baptist Health Brookwood Hospital, where Precious Johnson gave birth to a healthy baby.
Police allege that her husband, 19-year-old Kynath Terry Jr, opened fire on her around 9:30 p.m.; afterwards, he turned the gun on himself, committing suicide. The husband and wife were later pronounced dead.
While police confirmed that the newborn was unharmed, authorities have not clarified whether the baby was inside the room with the couple at the time of the ordeal. No one else was harmed during the incident, which is now being treated as an apparent murder-suicide by the Homewood Police Department.
The gunfire triggered an immediate lockdown of the hospital as officers responded to reports of shots fired inside the facility. Patients, visitors and staff were instructed to shelter in place while law enforcement secured the scene. The lockdown was lifted several hours later after authorities determined there was no active danger. Authorities later described the incident as “domestic in nature” and are investigating the circumstances surrounding the shooting.
According to reports, Terry’s mother said that there were problems in their marriage. The issues started weeks before the incident and persisted up to Johnson’s due date. However, the mother did not imagine that such a horrendous thing would happen at the hands of her son.
Terry recently graduated from Army National Guard training and then married Johnson. According to Terry’s mother, Johnson did wish for her husband’s relatives to be present at the hospital when she gave birth to their child. It remains unclear who, if anyone, from Johnson’s side of the family was at the hospital when the shooting occurred.
Danne Howard, president of the Alabama Hospital Association, described the incident as highly unusual. She said that in her more than 30 years working in health care across the state, she had not encountered a similar case of violence inside a hospital maternity unit. Howard also characterised the shooting as an isolated event and noted that a mandatory after-action review is expected to be conducted by the affected hospital. Afterwards, the findings will be used to implement enhanced security measures.