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Dramatic arrest ends Spring Lake shooting, standoff

Harnett County deputies crashed into a fleeing car in Spring Lake Friday morning and arrested the driver, ending what began hours earlier as a domestic dispute and shooting.

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SPRING LAKE, N.C. — Harnett County deputies crashed into a fleeing car in Spring Lake Friday morning and arrested the driver, ending what began hours earlier as a domestic dispute and shooting.

Ericka Boyd said her boyfriend, identified as Bradley Campbell, showed up at her home, at 28 Kelly Creek St in the Anderson Creek Mobile Home Park, shortly after 1:30 a.m. and became abusive.

"I woke up to him kicking in the door with a pistol in his hand," Boyd said. "When I saw the pistol in his hand, I started begging him not to hurt us."

She said Campbell was hitting her and some friends came to her aid. Campbell then shot Mark Simon three times in the abdomen, she said.

Lenterrell Ray, who also was in Boyd's home, said he felt lucky to escape after seeing Simon shot.

"After he shot him, I got up and ran in the kitchen to try to get to the back door. But I fell in the kitchen, and he was right there over me with a gun in my face," Ray said. "Then, he turned around to go back to the living room, and that's when I ran out the back door."

Boyd also was able to escape the home with her 2-month-old son, but Harnett County Sheriff Larry Rollins said Campbell held Simon and two other children, a 6-year-old boy and a 2-year-old girl, hostage inside.

Rollins said deputies responding to a report of a burglary, a domestic dispute and an assault then began negotiating with Campbell. They spoke with him through the night and persuaded him to release Simon shortly before 6:30 a.m. Two hours later, deputies talked him into letting the children go. They were unharmed.

Simon, 18, of Coats, was taken to Cape Fear Valley Medical Center in Fayetteville, and Rollins said he was in fair condition Friday morning.

Campbell threatened to kill himself several times during the standoff, Rollins said, coming out of the mobile home with a gun to his head before heading back inside.

"We had worked out with him to come out on his own. He came out of the house several times, but he would always have a gun to his head," the sheriff said. "So, we let him go back because we didn't want to harm him, obviously. At that point, he wasn't trying to harm us."

Shortly after 10 a.m., he emerged from the house again and jumped into a silver, four-door sedan and tried to drive off. Rollins said deputies opened fire on the car, trying to shoot out the tires. Deputies in patrol cars surrounded the sedan, crashing into it twice from different directions.

More than two dozen law enforcement officers from various agencies then surrounded the car with guns drawn, and several tried unsuccessfully to pry open the driver's door. They then broke out the driver's window and pulled the driver out through it and took him into custody.

Campbell, 22, of Lillington, was charged with attempted murder, five counts of first-degree kidnapping and possession of a firearm by felon.

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