Mpls. Boy, 16, Accused Of Waving Gun Around, Pointing It At 15-Year-Old Girl Before Fatal Shooting

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- Anoka County prosecutors are seeking to certify a 16-year-old boy as an adult after he allegedly fatally shot a 15-year-old girl while playing with a gun in Columbia Heights.

The Minneapolis boy faces second-degree manslaughter by juvenile petition in connection to the fatal shooting last Thursday evening. Court documents reveal that he was allegedly waving a gun around and pointing it at the victim before the fatal shooting occurred.

Columbia Heights police officers were dispatched shortly before midnight to an apartment on the 3900 block of Third Street Northeast on the report that someone was shot. Officers arrived and found a 15-year-old female victim unconscious in a bedroom and suffering from a gunshot wound to her torso.

First-responders tried to help the victim at the scene, but she was pronounced dead. She was later identified as Derryanna Davis of Columbia Heights.

According to the juvenile petition, the victim and the boy charged in her death were among a group of kids who were hanging out at the apartment. At one point, the boy was playing with the gun, "swinging it around" and pointing it at the group. Some witnesses said he was only pointing the gun at the victim, the juvenile petition said.

Due to the 16-year-old's dangerous behavior, one of the kids allegedly took the gun and pulled out the magazine, but the 16-year-old took it back and reloaded it. That's when he allegedly asked the group to dare him to shoot the victim, according to the juvenile petition. The gun then went off and fatally struck the victim.

"We're all hurt," said Mari Lee, Davis' friend. "I can't process it at all. She was like a sister to me like I never had, you know? So it's hard."

All but two of the kids fled the scene.

"That told me right there that nobody cared. You left her there. You left her there to die," Lee said. "Where were the parents at when these kids were playing with guns? That's what I would love to know."

Lee doesn't know the alleged suspect, but she wants him tried as an adult.

"I want them to know that she was loving and she was kind, and her life mattered," Lee said.

The Anoka County Sheriff's Office tells WCCO the teen turned himself in, and that the investigation is ongoing. He is currently in custody. If certified as an adult and convicted of second-degree manslaughter, the boy could face up to 10 years in prison.

"Any death in our community is sad, but this death in particular of a 15-year-old girl who died in such a tragic manner is especially heartbreaking," said Tierney Peters with the Anoka County Sheriff's Office.

WCCO does not typically name juvenile suspects unless they are formally charged as adults.