HOUSTON — Like many kids, Ronald Caldwell Jr. dreamed of playing in the NFL someday.
Instead, the family of the Northwestern State football player is planning his funeral after Caldwell, 21, was shot and killed earlier this month. He was found with multiple gunshot wounds by Natchitoches police officers who responded to the shooting overnight on Oct. 12.
“This has been a parent’s nightmare,” mother Blanche Caldwell said.
The Austin family has hired a Houston-based law firm and plan to take legal action against the Louisiana college, its football coach and others. Caldwell’s parents believe they dropped the ball in protecting their son who was on a full scholarship.
They said it all started when a mold issue at their son’s off-campus apartment led to him being moved to a unit with a non-student. Allegedly, that roommate became trouble.
“I called the coach, I text him, ‘Please move my son, somebody pulled a gun on him,’” Ronald Caldwell Sr. said. Three days later, he got the call every parent dreads.
“Next phone call I get from this man is at 2:07, 2:07 [a.m.] Thursday that my son is deceased,” Caldwell Sr. said.
Now the family’s attorneys are demanding accountability.
“The university and coach Brad Laird did nothing to protect Ronald Jr,” attorney Troy Pradia said to reporters.
As the school continues to grieve, the coach resigned, saying in a statement that Ronald Jr.’s death “was like losing a son.” The rest of the team’s football season was canceled, with the school saying “mental health and wellbeing of its student-athletes as the primary reason for its decision.”