State Watch

Boy shot during paintball ‘drive-by’ with father in Florida: police

A 10-year-old boy was shot during a paintball “drive-by” with his father in Florida, according to an Opa-locka police report.

Detectives say Michael Williams, 26 years old, agreed to drive his son to a friend’s house so he could shoot them with a paintball gun, the Miami Herald reported.

However, when they got to the house and the young boy began shooting at the crowd of children in the front yard, one resident thought they were real gunshots.

One witness told local outlet WSVN that the son and father had hoodies and ski masks on during the exchange, which the father denied.

Another resident, Gregory Barns, thought his family was “under attack” and shot one round from a real gun toward the vehicle and struck the child, according to the police report. 

After being shot, the boy lost his balance and proceeded to get run over by a van. It is unclear if the child was in the car and fell out or if he was already out of the car when he was shot.

His father took him to the hospital where the local outlet reported on Monday afternoon that the child was expected to recover.

Williams has been charged with child neglect with great bodily harm as police say he “acted recklessly by agreeing to conduct a drive by paint ball shooting,” according to the Miami Herald.

The incident occurred on Sunday evening after a mass shooting in Miami that killed two people earlier in the day.