- A 6-year-old girl and her father were shot in Gaston County, North Carolina.
- Police have issued warrants for the suspect for attempted murder and other charges.
- The shooting happened after the basketball rolled into the neighbor’s yard and children went to retrieve it.
A 6-year-old North Carolina girl is one of the victims in a shooting on Tuesday after a basketball rolled into a neighbor’s yard.
When the children playing with the ball went to retrieve it, the neighbor allegedly went inside, grabbed a gun, and returned, opening fire on the children, according to a report by Charlotte-based news station WBTV.
The unprecedented shooting comes a week after other young people were injured nationwide for innocent actions. On April 13, Kansas City, Missouri, teenager Ralph Yarl was shot in the head after going to the wrong house to pick up his younger siblings. Two days later, four friends pulled into the wrong driveway in New York, and the homeowner shot at the vehicle, killing 20-year-old Kaylin Gillis.
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And on April 18, four Texas cheerleaders were shot when one accidentally tried to enter the wrong car after cheer practice. Two of the cheerleaders, Heather Roth and Payton Washington, were hit with the bullets.
The North Carolina girl, who wasn’t named due to her age, described the bullet as hitting her face.
“The bullet came back and the bullet went in my cheek,” she told WBTV.
The suspect also allegedly shot the girl’s father, William White, in the back. The father is still recovering in a hospital with a punctured lung and liver problems.
“I couldn’t get inside in time so he just…he shot my daddy in the back,” the girl said. “After he hit my dad in the back, that’s when my dad dropped to the ground.”
Neighbors said the suspect, Robert Louis Singletary, was known for yelling at children in the neighborhood. When the gunfire began, parents allegedly rushed to grab their children, and that’s when the girl and her father, as well as another woman at the scene, were shot.
No fatalities have been reported in the incident.
Singletary allegedly left the scene after the shooting and has not yet been apprehended. A spokesperson for the Gaston County Police Department told Newsweek that as of Thursday afternoon, the suspect remained at large and the girl’s father was still in the hospital.
Newsweek reached out to Gaston County District Attorney Travis Page via email for comment.
Gaston County Police issued a statement about Singletary on Wednesday and said law enforcement has requested the assistance of the United States Marshals Regional Fugitive Task Force in the search. Crime Stoppers of Gaston County is offering a $1,000 reward for information leading to Singletary’s arrest.
Gaston County detectives have secured warrants for Singletary’s arrest in conjunction with the alleged crime, according to the statement. The warrants issued are for four counts of attempted first-degree murder, two counts of assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury, and one count of possession of a firearm by a felon.
As for the 6-year-old’s view of the manhunt, she hopes the person responsible for the crime is caught and sentenced.
“I want him to go to jail forever,” she said.
Update 04/20/23, 2:54 p.m. ET: This article was updated with comment from a spokesperson for the Gaston County Police Department.
