The 18-year-old gunman who shot and killed three people in Farmington, New Mexico, on Monday had struggles with mental health that were recently exacerbated by his parents’ split and his departure from his high school wrestling team, according to friends and family.
Three people were killed and six others wounded, including two police officers, when Beau Wilson opened fire in Brookside Park in Farmington — a city 50 miles outside of New Mexico’s four-corners state border with Colorado, Arizona and Utah.
Those fatally shot in Monday’s mass shooting were identified as Shirley Voita, 79, Gwendolyn Schofield, 97, and Schofield’s daughter, Melody Ivie, 73. All three women were in cars when the gunfire erupted.
While authorities have not yet publicly disclosed a motive, Wilson’s friends and family told NBC News he’d been going through a difficult time in recent months. Wilson was falling behind in his classes and was struggling to cope with his parents’ ongoing divorce, they said.
In February, he decided to quit the school’s wrestling team over his strained relationship with the head coach, according to Daxton Allison, one of Wilson’s former teammates, as well as Brent Stover, a Farmington High School wrestling coach who recently resigned.
Wilson’s mother, Lorry Rodriguez, said he relied on the sport as an outlet, adding that it kept him grounded and provided him with a sense of community and purpose as other areas of his life fell apart. “His life was going to practice, and when he didn’t have that, he had nothing,” she said.
Rodriguez went on to blame herself for the massacre and missing any warning signs that may have prevented the violence.
“How did I not know? I ask myself that,” she said.
Wilson was fatally shot during a brief gunfight with law enforcement. Farmington Police Chief Steve Hebbe said he believes Wilson had “made a decision that he [was] going to stand and fight it out until he [was] killed.”
