On Saturday morning, Ta’ Narius “TJ” Moore, Jr., 5, was thrilled when he was named an All-Star on his Alabama youth league football team.
Hours later, the spunky kindergartner was dead after being caught in the crossfire between two family members who were allegedly shooting at each other outside their apartment complex, the Birmingham Police Department says in a news release.
“He was a fun-loving guy,’’ his grandmother, Sherie Moore, told AL.com. “He was just a little kid.”
Moore is particularly devastated because her son, TaNarius Moore, Sr. — TJ’s father — was shot and killed in Collegeville in 2017.
After learning that her grandson had been killed, Sherie Moore told AL.com, “I just feel like life is so unfair.”
“I lost my son, and now I lost his junior,’’ she continued. “It’s just hard.”
Officers rushed to 33rd Terrace North and F.L. Shuttlesworth Drive at about 2:30 p.m. on Saturday in response to a 911 call about a shooting.
Upon arrival, officers found T.J. unresponsive and suffering from a gunshot wound, police say in the release.
He’d been shot in the head, AL.com reports.
He was rushed to a local hospital, Children’s of Alabama, where he was pronounced dead.
Police have an unidentified suspect in custody.
It is unclear whether police have made any arrests.
All police would say in the release is that two family members “were engaged in an altercation that led to both firing weapons at each other.”
“The victim received a gunshot wound as a result of the gunfire,” the release says.
“We’re talking to family members as we speak, trying to sort out what happened here,” Praytor said.
“It’s always a terrible thing when you lose a child out in the street,” he said. “When it’s a child who was with the person that they trust the most, and something like this happens, it’s heartbreaking.”
The ‘Heart and Soul’ of the DefenseTJ was a linebacker and running back for his football team, the Huffman Hurricanes, theboy’s coach, Tabios Darden, told CNN.
The coach, who’d just seen the promising young athlete hours before he died and told him he would be playing in the All-Star Game, took to Facebook to pay tribute to the little boy who lost his life.
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Like others in the community, Birmingham City Councilman William Parker still cannot believe a child was killed in such a senseless manner.
“We’re just in a state of shock,” he told AL.com. “This is just horrible. I just don’t know any way else to describe it.”
The Rev. Van Johnson, a local pastor, will hold a unity walk Monday night calling for an end to gun violence.
Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to call Birmingham homicide detectives at 205-254-1764 or Crime Stoppers at 205-254-7777.
source: people.com
