A 12-year-old girl allegedly shot and killed her 14-year-old cousin, then took her own life, but family members are pushing back on cops initially calling this a murder-suicide. Paris Harvey and Kuaron Harvey died in a “freak accident” when they were recording themselves, Paris’ mother Shinese Harvey said in a St. Louis Post-Dispatch report.
“It was no murder,” she said. “It wasn’t a suicide.”
She said she had not watched the footage and that relatives described it to her, but Paris’ grandmother Susan Dyson told the outlet about watching the Instagram Live footage.
“It wasn’t a situation where they were arguing or anything like that,” she said. “They were playing with the gun, when they shouldn’t have been. Of course, they shouldn’t have been doing it. I think it just went off. It went off by mistake.”
The police investigation is ongoing. Family members said they rented a house in St. Louis, Missouri, for birthdays in the month of March. Paris and Kuaron, who were so close they called each other sister and brother, were making a video in front of a bathroom mirror, relatives said. Kuaron was shot in the head, family said. Paris reached for the gun, and family suggested it might have accidentally went off again. Like Kuaron, Paris sustained a gunshot to the head, relatives said.
The teens were “trying to be too hip,” Shinese Harvey said.
Relatives said they think the gun belonged to Kuaron.
A GoFundMe for Paris raised $620 of a $9,000 goal as of Sunday. A separate campaign for Kuaron raised $368 of a $8,000 goal.
[Screenshot via KSDK]