Louisiana father kills eight children in domestic shooting, police say

Shreveport: A Louisiana father fatally shot eight children, including seven of his own, in an attack on his family Sunday morning that stretched across two houses in a Shreveport neighborhood left shaken by one of the nation’s deadliest mass shootings in recent years, police said. Two women, including the gunman’s wife, who was the mother of his children, were also shot and critically wounded, according to Shreveport Police Department spokesperson Chris Bordelon. Officials said the children — all killed in the same house — ranged in age from 3 to 11. The gunman, identified as 31-year-old Shamar Elkins, died after a police pursuit that ended with officers firing on him, according to Bordelon. Authorities did not say what may have set off the violence, but Bordelon said detectives were confident the shooting was “entirely a domestic incident.” The attack was the deadliest mass shooting in the U.S. in more than two years. “I just don’t know what to say. My heart is just taken aback,” Shreveport Police Chief Wayne Smith said. “I cannot begin to imagine how such an event could occur.” Bordelon said police were familiar with Elkins, who was arrested in a 2019 firearms case, but officials were not aware of any other domestic violence issues. Attacks began before sunrise Police said the attacks began before sunrise in a neighborhood south of downtown Shreveport when the suspect shot a woman at one home and then drove to the other location, “where this heinous act was carried out.” Seven children were killed inside the second house, and one was found dead on the roof after apparently trying to escape, Bordelon said. Another child jumped off the roof and was expected to survive after being taken to a hospital. State Rep. Tammy Phelps said some children tried to get away through the back door. “I can’t even imagine what the police officers and first responders actually dealt with when they got here today,” she said at a news conference. The victims were three boys and five girls, according to the Caddo Parish coroner’s office. Shamar Elkins and his wife were in the process of separating and were due in court Monday, said Crystal Brown, a cousin of one of the wounded women. Brown said the couple had been arguing about the separation before the shooting. “He murdered his children,” Brown said. “He shot his wife.” Elkins shared four children with his wife and three children with another woman who lived nearby and was also shot, according to Brown. All the children were together at one house, she said. Brown described all the children as “happy kids, very friendly, very sweet.” Liza Demming, who lives two houses down from where most of the victims were shot, said her security camera captured video of the suspect running away, along with the sound of two shots. “That’s pretty much all I saw — him running out of the house and the cars leaving,” she said. Demming later went outside and saw a child’s covered body on the home’s roof. Pastor Marty T. Johnson Sr., of nearby St. Gabriel Community Baptist Church, who owns one of the homes where the shootings occurred, said someone who works for him had rented it to the family, but he never had dealings with them. “What began as a domestic dispute has ended in irreversible harm,” the parish district attorney’s office said in a statement. It was the deadliest mass shooting in the U.S. since eight people were killed in a Chicago suburb in January 2024, according to a database maintained by The Associated Press and USA Today in partnership with Northeastern University. At a news conference outside the residence where one of the shootings occurred, officials appeared stunned, requesting patience and prayers from the community as they sorted through multiple crime scenes. “This is a tragic situation — maybe the worst tragic situation we’ve ever had,” said Tom Arceneaux, mayor of the northwestern Louisiana city of about 180,000 residents. “It’s a terrible morning.” Hours after the shooting, mourners gathered outside the single-story house on 79th Street and laid flowers. One door appeared stained with blood. Later that evening at a nearby prayer vigil, Kimberlin Jackson joined other community members who lit candles for the victims in a parking lot. “It just makes you take your children and hug them and hold them and tell them how much you love them,” she said.