Prominent Alabama judge shot in domestic dispute, son taken into custody 

A prominent Alabama state judge was seriously wounded Saturday when a domestic dispute escalated into a shooting, and authorities took his adult son into custody.

Montgomery County Judge Johnny Hardwick, a jurist for more than two decades and the current president of the Alabama Association of Circuit Court Judges, was listed in serious condition Saturday evening after undergoing surgery.

Montgomery County Sheriff Derrick Cunningham said Hardwick’s 36-year-old son, Khalfani Hardwick, was arrested shortly after the shooting occurred.

“I am just asking that we continue to pray for the judge,” Cunningham said.

Khalfani Hardwick pled guilty in June 2017 to shooting and wounding a man in the head in Montgomery in 2014, according to local TV reports.

Police said the judge was wounded in his home, and his son was arrested after fleeing. The exact motive for the shooting was not immediately known.

“Judge Hardwick was involved in a domestic incident with his son and suffered serious injuries from a gunshot wound,” Assistant Police Chief Wesley Richerson told The New York Post.