In yet another grim case of gun violence in the U.S., an 11-year-old boy from Tennessee has shot dead an 8-year-old girl on Saturday after she refused to let him see her puppy. The boy is facing charges of first degree murder as a juvenile.

The girl has been identified as McKayla Dyer. McKayla’s mother Latasha Dyer said the boy shot her child dead with his father’s shotgun as a result of a brawl over her puppy and that the two children went to the same school.

"He was making fun of her, calling her names, just being mean to her. He quit for a while and then all of a sudden yesterday he shot her," Latasha told WATE-TV. “I want her back in my arms, this is not fair, hold and kiss your babies every night because you’re never promised the next day with them. I hope the little boy learned his lesson because he took my baby’s life and I can’t get her back.”

According to neighbour Chasity Arwood, the shooting happened nearby her home where McKayla lived with her mother and two older siblings nearby. "Trying to comfort her mama and her aunt and her grandma and her grandpa and her sister and her brother was the hardest thing I ever had to do,” she told WBIR news.

The principal of the school that the children attended said there are extra counsellors at the schools as children will be returning to their classes without one of its own after the weekend. The principal also said that the incident isn’t only hurting the school but the whole community.

The incident took place only days after a mass shooting at a community college in Oregon drew international attention to United State’s gun violence. In another incident in Cleveland, Ohio, last week, a five-month-old girl named Aavielle Wakefield was killed when a bullet landed into her chest in a random shooting.

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