WELLINGTON, Fla. - A mother in the stands Friday night at Palm Beach Central High School underwent surgery Monday after being trampled during the chaos.
With her husband by her bedside, Kimberly Briard is now facing an uphill battle.
“She’s being tough, she’s being very strong,” said Bill Briard, who spoke with WPTV before his wife’s surgery.
The 55-year-old needs a total hip replacement after suffering a fractured femur. Briard was knocked to the ground and stepped on after the gunfire.
“I looked up into the stands to find out what all the noise was about, everyone was racing towards us,” Briard said. “She had already started down the stands to make her way out to chase after our daughter, and by the time I started catching up with her, she was trampled.”
The couple was in the stands watching their daughter cheer during the football game when the shots were fired late in the fourth quarter.
“It was intense because people were climbing up over me as I was trying to lift her up,” he recalled.
WPTV is also learning more about the two men who were shot outside the Palm Beach Central stadium. The sheriff’s office telling us the victims were targeted.
“He has a bullet that was still in him in his body and they were waiting for that to be removed,” said Gregg Lerman, a family friend of 39-year-old Daniel Foster Sr.
Lerman said Foster was shot in the back and suffered a collapsed lung and broken rib.
“He wants to make it clear, as far as he understands, he was not the target. He was not involved in the shooting,” Lerman said.
No arrests have been made.
On Monday, as sheriff’s deputies stood guard outside the school, Briard met with the principal at Palm Beach Central to talk safety concerns. He would not say what exactly was discussed, but hoped changes are made to prevent this from happening again.
“It scared hundreds of people. It’s a shame they brought the violence to school,” Briard said.
