With questions swirling around a bizarre double shooting in Ohio, the man who pulled the trigger on his ex-wife and her new husband has spoken out to insist he acted in self defense.
Robert ‘Lindsey’ Duncan and his wife Molly say that everything was quiet and normal at their home outside Yellow Springs, Ohio on Wednesday morning, until, Lindsey says, ‘all of a sudden, hell began.’
Killed were former stunt woman Cheryl Sanders, who is Lindsey’s ex-wife, and her new husband Reed Sanders, both of whom had apparently driven 440 miles from their home near Asheville, North Carolina to confront the Duncans in Ohio.
Friends of the Sanders couple say that Cheryl had planned to discuss issues with a children’s trust fund with her ex-husband, and cast doubt on whether Cheryl or Reed would ever initiate violence.
Not so, said Lindsey and Molly at an emotional press conference on Friday, where they described fighting for their lives after the other couple attacked them in an armed ambush with no warning.
Molly and Lindsey Duncan issued a statement on Friday about being ambushed and killing Lindsay’s ex-wife and her new husband outside of their home in Yellow Springs, Ohio
Reed and Cheryl Sanders had traveled from North Carolina to Ohio to attack her ex-husband and his new wife over a long-running dispute about their daughters’ college trust fund
Lindsay Duncan describes shooting dead his ex-wife Cheryl Sanders and her husband Reed
Cheryl Sanders and her new husband Reed Sanders had apparently driven 440 miles from their home near Asheville, North Carolina to confront the Duncans in Ohio
‘The word ambush is exactly what it was,’ Molly said, according to the Dayton Daily News. ‘We were caught off guard. They said nothing and they started shooting at us.’
Lindsey, a celebrity nutritionist who has appeared on ‘The Dr. Oz Show’ and ‘The View’, said that the ambush took place as he and Molly were returning from their routine visit to Yellow Springs for breakfast.
‘We get our coffee. We went to the emporium to get our eggs and our kale and our toast. And then we went home, like we do every day,’ he said.
Cheryl Sanders was shot dead by her ex-husband on Wednesday after she ambushed him
Robert said they stopped to get their gate to pick up a package and get their mail, when a large man in a camouflage mask and hoodie ran to his wife and held a gun 10 inches from her head.
‘I thought it was a bad nightmare. I didn’t know what to do,’ Lindsey said. ‘Whatever happened after that was instinct. It wasn’t me. It was instinct.’
Lindsey says that a running gun battle ensued, and that bullets flew mere inches from his wife’s head.
‘Thank god he knew how to respond and what to do,’ Molly said. ‘God was on our side that day, no question.’
Lindsey is not facing any charges in their deaths as police say he acted in self-defense and the shootings were justified.
Police believe the surveillance footage recovered from the incident proves Lindsey was acting in self-defense and that Sanders had threatened him and his wife.
Authorities recovered three firearms from the scene. Cops say that Lindsey Duncan has a concealed carry permit.
Molly Duncan claims Reed Sanders pointed a gun to her head in the attack
The couple were not identified by police for safety issues but chose to release a statement
Lindsay was the person to make the call 911 after the attack in which he is heard saying: ‘I shot them, they came up to our window and had a gun pointed at my wife’s head.’
Surveillance footage of the attack seems to confirm Duncan’s telling of the incident.
Reed Sanders was also found with several false forms of identity with him in addition to counterfeit car tags.
Officials said Reed Sanders had a previous criminal record but declined to release details.
‘[Cheryl] was threatening to kill the guy’s wife and he fired upon that person,’ explained Sheriff Gene Fischer.
‘About five years ago, the resident …notified us that he had received information that the ex-wife was trying to hire somebody to murder him,’ he continued, telling of a previous incident in which Duncan feared his ex-wife.
The Duncans had just pulled into their drive when an armed Reed Sanders approached them
Cheryl and Reed Sanders died from gunshot wounds in the shootout that followed
Police have said that Lindsay Duncan is not a suspect in their deaths as he acted in self defense
Police are still investigating what caused the couple to turn up armed to Duncan’s home but it is believed to have been due to on ongoing feud about money.
According to Citizen Times, the dispute involved the trust fund established for Cheryl Sanders and Lindsay Duncan’s two adult children, which was supposed to pay for the girls’ college expenses.
‘He has given them nothing but hell ever since she married him,’ a friend of Reed Sanders said of Lindsey Duncan, adding that the ex-husband was ‘domineering’ toward Cheryl Sanders.
‘He didn’t like the fact that she had remarried and was happy,’ he added.
‘Part of the problem is he had to sign off on wherever they went to school, and they didn’t go to the schools he wanted them to, so he refused on signing off on letting them have the money.’
Reed and Cheryl Sanders ran a nutrition and fitness company in North Carolina
The friend also confirmed that Sanders had a gun.
‘They carried them all the time,’ he said.
‘She carried one in her purse, and he carried one in a little saddle in the back of his pants. They both carried guns because they were afraid of Lindsey…’
In court documents sourced by Dayton Daily News, Cheryl Sanders and Lindsay Duncan signed a ‘prenuptial agreement in 1999, were married, then divorced in 2009’.
‘Since the divorce, the records indicate their relationship remained sour,’ the paper reported.
‘It’s a very complex set of facts,’ said Suzanne Schmidt, Greene County First Assistant Prosecutor, of the shooting.
‘What we plan to do in a case like this is…once the investigation is done have the matter presented to a Greene County grand jury for a review to see if any charges are warranted. That’s typically what we do but it’s going to be a long process.’
Cheryl Sanders, 59, began to work as a body double for Jessica Alba, left, and Brooke Shields, right, when she stopped doing work as a stunt woman because of a bad fall on set in 1989
Sanders previously worked as a Hollywood stunt double in the 1980s and appeared in the movie ‘Back to the Future’ and stood in for Rene Russo in The Thomas Crown Affair and the Lethal Weapon series.
Her stunts involved a 20-foot fall on the set of ‘Back to the Future, which brought her career to a halt in 1989. She shattered bones in her face, right arm and hand when a cable was released in the fall and she hit the concrete.
She also did double work for Jessica Alba in 2016 and some work for Brooke Shields.
The couple were living in North Carolina for the past four years where they ran a nutrition and fitness company.