Father of boy who killed himself with shotgun, charged with murder

DETROIT - A 9-year old boy fatally shot himself in the head with a shotgun he found inside a home on Detroit's west side.

A little boy named Daylen Head was killed Nov. 9 when he shot himself in the head. He had found his father's sawed off shotgun at his home on Barton Street.

Prosecutors say it is his father's fault and they are charging him with murder.

"I got called saying there was a 9-year-old that was shot," said Det. Robert Holmes.

On Tuesday Holmes read for the court how the boy's father Chris Head described what happened.

"'I heard a boom and I jumped up and ran upstairs,'" Holmes read in the statement. "'As I was running up the stairs, Taylor was running down the stairs yelling Daddy I didn't do nothing, I didn't do nothing,'"

Head passed his daughter and ran upstairs where he made the tragic discovery.

"'I see my son laying to the left and a shotgun laying to the right, I threw the shotgun back in the closet, I kneeled next to my son and saw his brains laying next to him and I lost it,'" Holmes read.

Head yelled for someone to call 911 then drove around looking for police - for help. But he knew it was too late, his daughter didn't understand.

"'She kept saying 'Daddy I didn't do nothing, I didn't do nothing, where's my brother. I want my brother - I didn't do nothing.'"

Holmes testified Head said the gun had been left there by the landlord. It was loaded and was stored in the closet and Head told his children not to go in the closet. The already emotional father sobbed in court.

"Question: 'Was there a lock on the closet door?' Answer: 'No sir, but it clicks when the door shuts. But there was no lock on the door.'"

Head's last words in his interview with the detective: "I love my boy and I'm going to miss him."

Prosecutors are now charging the 45-year-old father with second degree murder, involuntary manslaughter and child abuse as well as being a felon in possession of a firearm.

"That's not reasonably securing a loaded, sawed off shotgun in a closet, in a room where the video game is stored," said Judge Shannon Holmes. "Where this nine-year-old child goes into the room to play that video game -a closet that's accessible to him. A closet that is not locked and then you tell the 9-year-old - don't go in this closet.

"Every 9-year-old I know is going to go into that closet - every single one of them."

The judge ruled the case will go forward.

"Unfortunately because he made a choice to be in possession of a firearm that he was not legally supposed to be in possession of - not to mention that it's an illegal firearm - now his son is deceased," Judge Holmes said. "So I'm binding the defendant over as charged."