Woman Was Drinking Tequila Shots with Friends When a 4-Year-Old Found Her Gun and Fatally Shot a Young Boy By Bailey Richards 19

A Kansas woman will spend over three years behind bars after a child found her gun and used it to fatally shoot a young boy.

On Thursday, Oct. 16, Tasha Dillard was sentenced to 37 months in prison after pleading guilty to involuntary manslaughter and six counts of aggravated child endangerment, according to Wichita outlets KWCH, KAKE and The Wichita Eagle. Dillard, 25, had initially been charged with first-degree felony murder in connection to the death of Davion Gunter, 7.

In the early hours of March 16, Gunter and multiple other young children were in Dillard’s apartment in the Planeview neighborhood of Wichita while Dillard and her adult friends did tequila shots in her parked car, ABC affiliate KAKE reported, citing court documents.

Dillard told police she was hosting a small party for friends when “the adults went out to the parking lot to continue drinking,” The Wichita Eagle previously reported, citing a probable cause affidavit. She told police that she had spent most of the day drinking alcohol, per the newspaper.

While inside without adult supervision, one of the children, a 4-year-old, discovered a loaded gun in the apartment and shot Gunter in the upper torso, according to KAKE and The Wichita Eagle. The 7-year-old was taken to the hospital, where he later died of his injuries.

The 4-year-old told authorities that he found the weapon in Dillard’s purse, which was unattended on the counter in the kitchen, The Wichita Eagle reported, citing an affidavit. The child also told police that the kids were “playing guns” when Gunter was shot, and that he had discharged the weapon after following the 7-year-old into Dillard’s bedroom, according to the Kansas newspaper. 

Other children told authorities that some of them had played with “an orange toy gun earlier in the night,” and said they had posed with the real gun thinking it was also a toy, according to The Wichita Eagle.

One woman at the Wichita apartment at the time of the incident told police that she knew Dillard had purchased a gun weeks before the shooting, according to Law & Crime. Dillard first claimed she did not own a gun, but later admitted to owning it, the outlet reported, citing court documents.

Initially, court documents state, Dillard was “adamant she did not own any firearms and did not have any guns in the house,” according to Law & Crime. Later, after she admitted to having a gun, she said she placed it where it was not easily spotted, behind her purse. 

The weapon was left on the counter, where the 4-year-old ultimately found it, after one of Dillard’s friends took a video with it to “look cute” for a social media post, Dillard said, per Law & Crime.

While appearing before a judge at her Oct. 16 sentencing hearing, Dillard apologized, according to The Wichita Eagle. Speaking in the courtroom, she tearfully said that she “never intended for anybody to get hurt,” adding, “I wish I had never been outside that night.”

Gunter’s mother, Ataya Johnson, is a friend of Dillard’s, and requested leniency for the 25-year-old at the emotional hearing, asking the judge to grant her friend probation instead of prison time, The Wichita Eagle reported.

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“I don’t think that she deserves to go to prison,” Johnson said at the hearing, according to the newspaper. She also described Dillard as a “really good person,” adding, “She wouldn’t hurt anybody.”

In a GoFundMe Johnson created in March, the grieving mom wrote that her son “was taken from us too soon.” The 7-year-old “brought so much joy to everyone around him, and his vibrant spirit will be deeply missed by his family, friends, and the entire community,” she wrote.