If you're struggling with mental health and having thoughts of suicide, please call the National Suicide and Crisis Hotline by dialing 988.
After the police shooting of a man in Pierce Township early Saturday morning, his family is speaking out about who he was and what happened leading up to the shooting.
Clermont County deputies said the situation began at 12:10 a.m. Saturday, when Clermont County dispatchers received a 911 call from a man who told them "there is a man with a gun" at the Eastgate Mobile Home Park in Pierce Township.
Dispatchers said a woman could be heard in the background saying the man with the gun was "intoxicated and suicidal," according to a release from the Clermont County Sheriff's Office.
Pierce Township police and Clermont County deputies arrived at the scene at 12:18 a.m., and they told dispatchers that they had encountered the armed man, deputies said.
WATCH: Family says man shot and killed by police only wanted to hurt himself
The man "refused multiple orders to drop the firearm," which prompted a deputy and a police officer to fire, striking him, deputies said.
Pierce Township EMS arrived within minutes of the shooting and attempted to save the man's life. He was pronounced dead around 1 a.m.
No law enforcement officers were injured in the incident.
The man's family asked that his identity, as well as their own, not be disclosed because they have not yet notified all of his extended family about what happened.
The man's niece said he had called 911 early Saturday morning, looking for help.
"He called and gave them his address and said he had a gun he wanted to kill himself. He was not gonna hurt anybody else," the man's niece said. "He felt like he needed somebody to step in and save him from himself. What happened?"
The family said the man survived a widowmaker heart attack last year, and the decline in his physical health had a negative impact on his mental health, causing depression.
"Unfortunately, it was just one of those situations that we couldn't control, and he handled it the best way that he thought was possible," the man's niece said. "As soon as his body started giving out on him, so did his brain. He's been a shell of a person for the last six months, if not year."
The man worked as a landscaper and was a dedicated father to a 2-year-old girl and a loving husband, his family said. They remember counting at least five shots being fired at him Saturday morning.
"He would give his shirt off his back to anybody, anybody they wouldn't even have to ask. He was just that kind of person," the man's wife said. "You gotta live with it like you gotta go one day at a time. But what do you do when your daughter says, 'Where's my daddy?'"
The family was adamant that the man was not looking to hurt anyone but himself. They said they wish the situation could have been deescalated.
"Please reach out to somebody, because it doesn't make you any less of a person, because you don't want to go through this. Your kids should not have to go through this," the man's wife said.
Neighbors in the mobile home park are left grappling with loss and confusion as they piece together what happened. Kylie Rackley lives near the scene of the shooting.
"It definitely made some of our neighbors pretty anxious," Rackley said. "I teared up a little. I ain't going to lie. I'm a little emotional with things like that."
Agents with the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation are now investigating the shooting.
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