A 13-year-old girl has been fatally shot in the head by her brother in Mississippi, according to local police. The tragic shooting is believed to have taken place over a video game.
Monroe County Sheriff Cecil Cantrell said the girl would not give her brother a video game controller, and that she was shot in the back of the head with a .25 caliber handgun, the Jackson Clarion Ledger reports. Authorities don’t yet know how the child accessed the gun. According to Cantrell, the children’s mother was feeding other children in another room when the shooting occurred.
"He’s just 9. I assume he’s seen this on video games or TV. I don't know if he knew exactly what this would do,” Cantrell said. “I can’t answer that. I do know it’s a tragedy."
Authorities arrived at the scene at approximately 1 pm local time Sunday, Cantrell told WTVA. The 13-year-old was rushed to Le Bonheur's Children's Hospital in Memphis where she later died at roughly at 6:45 pm Sunday.
"This is all new ground for us, we've never dealt with a kid shooting a kid at age 9," Cantrell said. "We don't know yet what kind of charges or if charges will be pressed. We want to make sure we’re doing everything correctly.”
"That’s why I’m not too fast to say anything because there are juveniles involved. We want to do what’s right and we’re going to get it right."
This is the second juvenile sibling shooting to occur in the US this month. On March 2, nine-year-old Branden Patten died after being shot by his seven-year-old brother in Archuleta County, Colorado, the Durango Herald reports. Branden was shot in the neck after he and his three brothers found a gun in a neighboring summer house. He was found dead at the scene.
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