RIVER RIDGE (AP) — The brother of state District Judge June Darensburg was found shot to death Friday morning in suburban New Orleans, right outside the home where he lived, according to authorities and relatives.

Wendell Berry, 50, was found lying face up near the home’s driveway after someone called 911 around 5 a.m., police said. He had been shot several times.

Darensburg, who serves on the 24th Judicial District Court in Jefferson Parish, gathered with friends and family at the home. She said her brother was a gifted track athlete at Bonnabel High School and worked as a baggage handler for Delta Airlines several years ago.

Family spokesman Byron Arthur said Berry ‘‘loved his family fiercely, his brother, his sister, his cousins. Everybody loved him.’’

The sheriff’s office said Berry had previous drug and gun convictions.

In September 1995, he pleaded guilty to two counts of distributing drugs and one count of possessing a firearm while in possession of drugs, said sheriff’s spokesman Col. John Fortunato.

Berry pleaded guilty to possessing drugs two years before that, the sheriff’s office said.

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Information from: The Times-Picayune, http://www.nola.com