A Louisiana man was arrested after allegedly shooting his 14-year-old neighbor in the back of her head on Sunday, according to local authorities. The man told police he had “unknowingly” hit the girl after opening fire on a group of people running away from his home—kids playing hide-and-seek, as it later turned out.
In the “early morning hours” of the day, according to a news release from the Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office, deputies were called to a tiny Lake Charles neighborhood for a reported shooting.
After the wounded teenage girl was found at the scene, detectives were summoned, discovering that several children had been playing in the area, hiding on a neighbor’s property.
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“When detectives spoke with the property owner, David V. Doyle, 58, [of] Starks, he stated he observed shadows outside his home, at which time he went inside and retrieved his firearm,” the sheriff’s office said.
Doyle then told the investigators he went back outside and began firing at the people he saw running away from his home.
The girl was taken to a hospital out of town with non-life-threatening injuries, according to the sheriff’s office. Family members told KPLC 7 News, a local NBC affiliate, that she was “okay and recovering.”
The outlet noted that the neighborhood where the shooting took place “is a dead-end road with only three residents: Doyle, the victim’s family and a relative to the victim’s family.”
A local resident with ties to the girl’s family told The Daily Beast that Doyle’s nephew was playing hide-and-seek with the victim when she was shot.
“Things like this need to stop,” the family acquaintance said. “I believe in people owning guns, but your life has to be in danger first. That man’s life was not in danger… It was just lucky, that her guardian angel had their hand on her, and it wasn’t worse than it was.”
Doyle was booked at 6:45 a.m. Sunday, online records show. Charged with aggravated battery, four counts of aggravated assault with a firearm and illegal discharge of a firearm, Doyle remained in custody as of midday Tuesday.
Reached by phone on Tuesday, the girl’s mother said she needed to check with her lawyer before commenting.
The shooting is one of several such incidents—involving young victims making a common mistake and armed older people reaching for their firearms in response—in recent weeks.
Last month, 16-year-old Black honors student Ralph Yarl was wounded by gunfire after he rang an 84-year-old Missouri resident’s doorbell by accident. Just two days later, a 20-year-old woman named Kaylin Gillis was killed by a 65-year-old man in upstate New York after pulling up his driveway while looking for a friend’s house.
