STAFF REPORT
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MIDLOTHIAN – Midlothian Police investigated a shooting this past week.
On April 5 at 7:13 p.m., North Ellis Emergency Dispatch Center received several 911 calls regarding a shooting in the 400 block of Brook Meadow Drive in Midlothian.
Shots were heard inside and outside the home and reported hearing these shots to dispatch.
Midlothian patrol officers were dispatched to the location and during that time a 911 call also came in from a resident of 410 Brook Meadow Drive advising his father, later identified as Mark Robert Nienhuis, 37, of Midlothian came to the location and allegedly started an altercation with family members.
Nienhuis went to his truck and retrieved a handgun. He then walked back to the house and fired several rounds, one of which struck the caller’s 11 year-old sister.
Nienhuis then drove away from the scene.
Moments later, Nienhuis returned to 410 Brook Meadow Drive and was confronted by another son who had armed himself with a rifle.
At that time the individuals exchanged gunshots in the front yard of the home.
Police reported no one was injured during the second shooting.
There were houses and vehicles belonging to neighbors damaged by the gunfire.
When Midlothian patrol officers arrived at the scene at 7:17 p.m. they confronted Nienhuis, who was also armed with a knife.
Officers asked Nienhuis to drop the knife, but he refused.
He then stabbed himself in the neck.
At that time officers charged him and retrieved the knife.
When the scene was secured, medical personnel from the Midlothian Fire Department treated and transported the injured parties.
Police also reported, “Investigators from the Midlothian Police Department Criminal Investigations Division responded to Brook Meadow Drive, as well as the hospitals to which the injured parties were transported, to begin their investigation.”
Nienhuis is currently in police custody at an undisclosed hospital. He is in serious condition from the stab wound to his neck.
He also faces one count of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon causing serious bodily injury (1st degree felony), as well as eight separate counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon (2nd degree felony).
There are no charges against the second shooter who appeared to be defending himself and his family. The 11-year-old child was transported to Children’s Medical Center in Dallas where she was treated for a gunshot wound to the leg.
She was later released from Children’s Medical Center in Dallas.
