'Toxic' Mom Called Family Meeting Before Opening Fire

Slain daughter was days away from marrying
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Jun 28, 2016 3:55 AM CDT
Updated Jun 28, 2016 6:33 AM CDT
'Toxic' Mom Called Family Meeting Before Opening Fire
Christy Sheats is seen in this photo from her Facebook page.   (Facebook)

Chilling details are continuing to surface in the shooting that left a mother and her two daughters dead in Texas. Authorities say Christy Sheats called a "family meeting" on Friday—her husband's birthday—and opened fire on daughters Madison, 17, and Taylor, 22, with a five-shot, .38-caliber handgun after the family gathered in the living room of their Katy-area home, NBC reports. The husband and both daughters fled, but Madison collapsed and died soon after leaving the house, investigators say. Sheats shot Taylor outside the home, went inside to reload, and returned to shoot her daughter again, witnesses say. Police officers saw the final shot and killed Sheats after she refused to drop the gun. The Houston Chronicle reports that Taylor had planned to marry her boyfriend on Monday, and may have obtained a marriage license the day she was killed.

Maj. Chad Norvell of the Fort Bend County Sheriff's Office tells CBS News that the husband and wife had been arguing before the shooting. Norvell says Jason Sheats has been interviewed by police, but they don't want to "push him too much" because "he is in a difficult state right now." Family friend Madison Davey tells KTRK that the sisters were "daddy's girls," and the father has told her Sheats killed them to make him suffer. "He told Christy, 'Just shoot yourself. Make it easy on all of us, just shoot yourself,' and she said, 'No, that's not what this is about, this is about punishing you,'" Davey says. "I always knew something would happen, but I never thought she would do this. Christy was toxic for the family. She was mentally unstable." (More Texas stories.)

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