Wife Says Fla. School Gunman Missed On Purpose, Cops Disagree

ABCNews

“He didn’t want anyone to get hurt but himself,” Clay Duke’s wife, Rebecca Duke, told reporters Wednesday. Rebecca Duke, who called 56-year-old Clay Duke a “gentle giant,” said he was trying to stand up for her after she lost her job as a special education teacher in 2008.

“Basically …he loved me, he loved his family, and he was just trying to have people stop as he would say dump on me,” she said.

But police aren’t buying it and say that while Duke’s motive may never fully be known, there’s little doubt he went into that school board meeting Tuesday with anything but mayhem on his mind.

“I stick by my point that I believe Mr. Duke went there with a purpose and that purpose was to do harm and possibly kill other individuals,” Panama City Police Deputy Chief Robert Colbert told “Good Morning America.” “I understand that that may be a part of the reasoning process for her [Rebecca Duke] that he went there to scare people, but I believe law enforcement is operating on the full notion that he went there to harm or kill superintendent [Bill] Husfelt.”

Duke’s wife said he was bipolar and took medication for mental health issues. Colbert said he could not specifically confirm Duke’s condition, but mental issues “probably” played a part.

Police said Duke had planned the attack carefully, carrying two full clips of bullets. The date of the attack, Dec. 14, was circled in red on a calendar in Duke’s home, investigators said. Before he was wounded by security officer Mike Jones, police said Duke fired 14 shots — none of them hitting their targets.

Duke’s first shot, which Husfelt said was aimed directly at him from no more than 15 feet away, somehow missed. After a few more wild shots, Duke exchanged several shots with Jones before he was wounded. He used his final shot to take his own life, police said.

Jones was taken to the hospital with chest pains after the shooting, but has been released.

The incident began Tuesday, when according to police, Duke disrupted the school board meeting by proclaiming he had “a motion” and spray-painted a large “V” with a circle around it on the wall. When he turned back around, Duke threatened the room with a gun.

“The painting was disconcerting, the gun was pure terror,” school board member Ginger Littleton said.

Inside the meeting was reporter Nadeen Yanes of ABC affiliate WMBB-TV, who shot the exclusive video of the incident.

In the video, Duke is seen dismissing the women and children from the room before school superintendent Bill Husfelt tried to talk Duke out of the attack, or at least letting the other board members go.

But after she was dismissed and given the chance to leave with her life, Littleton stopped and thought about her friends who were still in danger. Instead of fleeing, she turned back, snuck up and attacked Duke with her purse.

“I had the choice of leaving,” Littleton told “Good Morning America” Wednesday. “When I turned back around he was up on the level with my guys and they were all sitting there lined up like ducks in a pond … completely defenseless.

“So I could either walk away, thinking something bad was going to happen and try to live with myself, or I could try to do something to divert or delay. So my bag was what I had and so that’s what I did,” Littleton said.

In a video that was recording the board meeting, Littleton is seen sneaking up behind Duke before smacking his arm with her purse. Duke overpowered Littleton but let her go again.

Then, school superintendent Husfelt attempted to talk Duke out of the attack, or at least into allowing others to leave.

“Will you let them go? You’re obviously upset at me, so why are they here?” Husfelt said in the video. “This isn’t worth it. This is a problem.”

Then, when Duke trained his weapon on Husfelt, Husfelt shifted in his seat and asked, “Please don’t. Please don’t. Please.”

Duke fired and Husfelt hit the floor, but he was not shot — a miracle, he said.

“Right before he pulled that trigger, I knew he was going to pull the trigger,” Husfelt told “GMA” today. “There was a miracle that I wasn’t shot. He literally had the gun pointed right at me. … God was standing in front of me. I believe that with all my heart.”

After the shots were fired, Mike Jones, a security officer in the building, responded.

“He knew he was supposed to wait for backup, but he knew at the time he couldn’t,” Husfelt said. “Mike saved our lives. … This tragedy could’ve been huge on many levels.”

Jones and Duke exchanged fire before Duke was struck. In the video he is seen falling to the floor before using his gun to take his own life. Police said 10 shots were fired altogether and no one else was hurt.

“Mike saved the day. There’s no doubt,” Littleton said.

Police are investigating Duke’s possible motive. In the video, Duke told the school board members they’d fired his wife.

“We still don’t know what he was talking about,” Husfelt said. “We’d never seen him.”

But Husfelt said it was obvious something was wrong with the man.

“He was looking at you, but he seemed distant. … He had some problems,” he said. “He had planned to die then and there. There’s no doubt about that.”

Similar to the painting on the wall, Duke’s Facebook page showed a “V” with a red circle around it — a symbol made famous in the movie “V for Vendetta,” which is about an anarchist hero. On his Facebook page, Duke railed against the wealthy.