SUTHERLAND SPRINGS, TX - NOVEMBER 10: Visitors pay respects at a memorial where 26 crosses were placed to honor the 26 victims killed at the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs on November 10, 2017 in Sutherland Springs, Texas.
On November 5, The U.S. Air Force must pay more than $230 million in damages to survivors and victims’ families of a 2017 Texas church massacre for failing to flag a conviction that might have kept the gunman from legally buying the weapon used in the shooting, a federal judge ruled Monday.More than two dozen people were killed when Devin Patrick Kelley opened fire during a Sunday service at First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs.
Kelley, who died of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound after being shot and chased by two men who heard the gunfire at the church, had served in the Air Force before the attack.RELATED: Friends grieve, remember Sutherland Springs church shooting victimsU.S.
District Judge Xavier Rodriguez had ruled in July that the Air Force was "60% liable" for the attack because it failed to submit Kelley’s assault conviction during his time in the Air Force to a national database.An Air Force record of the Kelley court-martial says he pleaded guilty to multiple specifications of assault, including striking his wife, choking her with his hands and kicking her.