By Mirna Alsharif and TJ Swigart —
NBC News
A 10-year-old Texas boy confessed
having shot and killed a man while he slept two years ago, according to the Gonzales County Sheriff's Office.
Brandon O'Quinn Rasberry, 32, was found dead at Lazy J RV Park on January 18, 2022, inside his mobile home in Nixon, Texas, about 60 miles east of San Antonio, authorities said this week. in a press release. An autopsy determined that the man was shot in the head and that the manner of death was homicide.
In addition, the Gonzales County Sheriff's Office indicated that it learned of the minor's involvement in the shooting on April 12, when a principal from the Nixon Smiley Independent School District called to report him for allegedly threatening a day earlier to “assault and kill another student on a bus.”
“A deputy was sent to the school to take a report and complete an investigation,” the sheriff's office said in the statement. “Upon arrival he spoke with school officials, who informed him that the boy had stated that he had shot and killed a man two years ago.”
The boy was taken to a children's advocacy center where he was interviewed and given first-hand information about Rasberry's murder. He told investigators he was visiting his grandfather on Jan. 16, 2022, at Lazy J RV Park when he retrieved a 9mm handgun from the glove compartment of his grandfather's truck,
entered the man's motor home and shot him in the head. head while he was sleeping
, according to the sheriff's office. He also claimed that he fired the gun again on the couch inside the motor home before leaving.
“When questioned, the boy stated that he had never met Brandon and did not know who he was, although he had observed him walking around the mobile home earlier that day,” the sheriff's office added. “They also asked the boy if he was angry at Brandon for any reason or if he had ever done anything to make him angry, the boy responded no.”
Investigators found the gun the boy said he used to kill Rasberry at a pawn shop in Seguin, Texas. A forensic analysis of two bullet casings from the crime scene determined that the gun was used in the murder, the sheriff's office said.
Murder charges will not be filed against the child because Texas law “provides that a child is not criminally culpable until he or she turns ten years old,” according to the sheriff's office. The little boy was seven years old at the time of the murder, just a week before his eighth birthday.
He was placed in emergency detention for 72 hours and transferred to a psychiatric hospital in San Antonio for evaluation and treatment. The juvenile was then taken to the Gonzales County Sheriff's Office and
charged with terroristic threatening for the school bus incident.
He is being held in Gonzales County awaiting his court date. It is unclear if the boy has an attorney at this time.
NBC News has reached out to the sheriff's office for additional information.