Brother playing with gun accidentally kills 11-year-old in NE Miami-Dade home, cops say
An 11-year-old boy was killed by gunfire in his Northeast Miami-Dade home when his brother found their parents’ gun and accidentally fired it, striking Shemarion Burse in the chest, police said Friday.
Miami-Dade Police said the child’s 13-year-old brother found the firearm in its case in the master bedroom closet. Both parents were at work, police said, and no charges are expected to be filed. Police said Shemarion was home with four siblings, ages 9 to 15 when the shooting happened.
“It appears the child accidentally discharged it,” said Miami-Dade Police spokesman Christopher Sowerby-Thomas.
On Friday morning the boy’s mother, Tiffany Callaway, called the incident a family “tragedy” and set up a GoFundMe page to help with burial expenses. Police identified her as a Miami-Dade Corrections officer.
She called Shemarion loving, playful and “the light of our life.”
“Imagining life without him is something we never thought we’d have to do as a family,” she wrote. “And even worse, we have to lay him to rest. We weren’t prepared for this tragedy and are simply asking for a kind hand.”
Police said they received a 911 call Thursday afternoon and officers arrived at the family’s home at an apartment in the 600 block of Ives Dairy Road shortly after 5 p.m. They found Shemarion with a gunshot wound to his chest. He was airlifted to Jackson Memorial Hospital’s Ryder Trauma Center but died from his injuries, said Miami-Dade Police Spokesman Alvaro Zabaleta.
This story was originally published November 11, 2022 at 12:33 PM.
