Two young cousins are dead after one fatally shot the other before shooting herself, according to police, in what family members called a "freak accident" during a birthday party at a St. Louis apartment on Friday.
Paris Harvey, 12,and Kuaron Harvey, 14, were shot and killed while the cousins were livestreaming on Instagram from the apartment's bathroom at about 2:00 a.m. Friday, according to the family. The cousins were attending a family party to celebrate younger relatives' birthdays for the month of March.
Police are still investigating the shooting but initially called it a "murder-suicide."
"We are sending our heartfelt condolences to the family of 12-year-old Paris Harvey and 14-year-old Kuaron Harvey who tragically passed away on 03/25/22," the St. Louis Police Department wrote on social media.
Paris' motherShanise Harvey, 35, said she didn't know who the gun belonged to or how her daughter found it.
"They [were] making a video and she was playing with the gun, but it went off and hit him," Harvey told NBC affiliate KSDK in an interview. "To my knowledge, then she picked it up, she picked it up by the barrel, and it went off again... It was not a suicide. It was just a freak accident."
THIS NEWS IS DEVELOPING INTO THE EVENING:For an update later tonight, sign up for the Evening Briefing.
Susan Dyson, the cousins' grandmother, told the St. Louis Dispatchshe'd seen the Instagram Live video depicting the shooting.
“It wasn’t a situation where they were arguing or anything like that. They were playing with the gun, when they shouldn’t have been," Dyson told the Dispatch."Of course, they shouldn’t have been doing it. I think it just went off. It went off by mistake.”
Family members said Paris, who was one of nine children, was a funny seventh grader who loved getting her hair and nails done and had a beautiful voice. They described Kuaron as a goofy eighth grader who had long been able to do backflips.
Contributing: The Associated Press
