{"id":208333,"date":"2026-04-20T19:37:20","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T19:37:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/louisiana-authorities-identify-eight-children-killed-in-domestic-incident-the-guardian\/"},"modified":"2026-04-20T19:37:20","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T19:37:20","slug":"louisiana-authorities-identify-eight-children-killed-in-domestic-incident-the-guardian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/louisiana-authorities-identify-eight-children-killed-in-domestic-incident-the-guardian\/","title":{"rendered":"Louisiana authorities identify eight children killed in \u2018domestic incident\u2019 – The Guardian"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gunman, identified as Shamar Elkins, fatally shot the children \u2013 including seven of his own \u2013 at two addresses
Mass shooting rampage in Louisiana leaves eight children dead and others wounded<\/a>
Sign up for the Breaking News US newsletter email<\/a>
Louisiana<\/a> authorities have identified eight children \u2013 aged three to 11 \u2013 who were killed<\/a> on Sunday during what police described as a \u201cviolent domestic incident\u201d in Shreveport that marked the deadliest US mass shooting in more than two years.
The Caddo parish coroner\u2019s office identified the children as Jayla Elkins, three; Shayla Elkins, five; Kayla Pugh, six; Layla Pugh, six; Markaydon Pugh, 10; Sariahh Snow, 11; Khedarrion Snow, 6; and Braylon Snow, five.
The gunman, identified as 31-year-old Shamar Elkins, fatally shot the children \u2013 including seven of his own \u2013 at two separate Shreveport houses. Police shot him to death after chasing him after he stole a car, according to investigators.
A total of 11 people were shot during Sunday\u2019s violence, a police spokesperson, Christopher Bordelon, said in a news conference.
The two women who were injured included Shaneiqua Pugh, the gunman\u2019s wife and mother of four of his children. The other wounded woman reportedly was the mother of Elkins\u2019s three other children.
Both injured women were listed in critical condition.
Bordelon told the Associated Press on Sunday evening that Elkins shot the mother first and then killed eight children. Elkins and Pugh had reportedly been arguing about their separation, over which they were due in court on Monday.
Bordelon said there was still much to investigate \u2013 but detectives were confident the shooting was \u201centirely a domestic\u201d case.
The Louisiana<\/a> state police by Monday had taken over the officers\u2019 killing of Shamar Elkins, saying, \u201cOne subject was shot and has been pronounced dead. No officers were harmed during the incident.\u201d
Police have said Elkins had been arrested in 2019 in a firearms case \u2013 but they were unaware of any prior domestic violence issues.
Wayne Smith, the Shreveport police chief, said he was \u201ctaken aback\u201d by the deadly shooting, adding that members of his agency were out in the community processing the scene. Smith said officers would work diligently for \u201chowever long it takes\u201d to find out what happened.
\u201cMy heart is just taken aback,\u201d Smith said at a press conference about the mass killing in his city. \u201cI just cannot begin to imagine how such an event can occur.\u201d
Tom Arceneaux, the Shreveport mayor, meanwhile described the killings as \u201cmaybe the worst tragic situation we\u2019ve \u2026 had\u201d in recent memory.
Sunday\u2019s killings in Shreveport represent the deadliest US mass shooting since January 2024, when an attacker shot and killed eight people in a suburb of Chicago, according to a USA Today and Associated Press database.<\/a>
Elkins, the gunman, is reported to have been struggling with mental health problems \u2013 but police have not offered a motive. The US army said that Elkins served in the Louisiana army national guard from 2013 to 2020 as a signal support system specialist and a fire support specialist. He later worked for the UPS delivery service.
Relatives of the gunman have described Elkins as stressed about his relationship with his wife, Shaneiqua Pugh. The New York Times reported that he called his mother and stepfather on 5 April \u2013 Easter Sunday \u2013 and told them through tears that he wanted to take his own life.
He purportedly told his stepfather Marcus Jackson his wife wanted a divorce \u2013 and that he was having \u201cdark thoughts\u201d.
\u201cI told him, \u2018You can beat stuff, man. I don\u2019t care what you\u2019re going through, you can beat it,\u2019\u201d Jackson said. \u201cThen I remember him telling me: \u2018Some people don\u2019t come back from their demons.\u2019\u201d
His mother, Mahelia Elkins, told the outlet that she did not know what problems her son was having with his wife.
Mahelia Elkins disclosed that she had her son when she was a teenager and addicted to crack cocaine \u2013 and he had been raised by Betty Walker, a family friend.
Walker, who did not witness the shootings, told the Times that Elkins shot his wife several times, including in the head and in the stomach.
Both said they had recently felt uneasy about their son. But he had shared a prayer on Facebook \u2013 \u201cDear God, today I ask you to help me guard my mind and my emotions\u201d \u2013 and sent them a photo of his family.
His mother told the Times that she had texted him the previous week to ask how they were. He responded: \u201cEveryone is doing OK.\u201d But when she texted on Thursday to send her love to her grandchildren, she received no response back.
Jackson said the first indication he received that something bad had happened was on Sunday when strangers posted on his Facebook that Elkins was \u201cthe devil\u201d.
Elkins\u2019s prior brushes with the law included an arrest for allegedly driving while inebriated in 2016 \u2013 and in 2019, he allegedly pulled a handgun out of his waistband and shot at a vehicle five times after the driver of the car had pulled a gun on him.
Court records show Elkins pleaded guilty in October 2019 to illegal use of weapons or dangerous instrumentalities.
Willie Vasher, a colleague of Elkins\u2019s at UPS, told the Times that Elkins presented as if he were a devoted father \u2013 but he often appeared stressed and would pull his hair out, causing a bald spot.
Separately, in a conversation with the Washington Post<\/a>, Elkins\u2019s brother-in-law, Troy Brown, who lived with him, said Elkins acted normally the last time they saw each other on Saturday. But Brown told the Post that Elkins had been distraught in a recent conversation about his wife recently seeking a divorce.
\u201cAfter the first argument about the divorce, he acted like he was losing his mind,\u201d Brown said to the Post after reportedly leaving a Shreveport hospital where he had visited Elkins\u2019s wife. \u201cHe was upset about it. I would talk to him and he would tell me, \u2018Bro, I don\u2019t want to lose my wife.\u2019\u201d
Aspects of Sunday\u2019s mass killing in Shreveport fit the definition of a type of crime known since the 1980s as a family annihilation.
Most of those cases involve a male killer armed with a gun who ultimately kills himself or is killed after killing multiple close family members. American communities have historically tended to view family annihilations as isolated tragedies. But a July 2023 Indianapolis Star investigation found they had been occurring across the US every five days on average at the time.
Sunday\u2019s bloodshed in Shreveport was the seventh mass killing in the US so far in 2026, according to the Gun Violence Archive<\/a>. The archive \u2013 a non-partisan reference resource \u2013 defines mass killings as cases in which four or more victims are killed.
Furthermore, as of Monday, there had been at least 114 mass shootings reported across the US so far for the year, according to the archive.
The archive defines mass shootings as cases in which four or more victims are shot or killed.
Meanwhile, Louisiana generally ranks lowly among US states with respect to mental health care access. A 2024 report<\/a> from the state\u2019s department of health highlighted intimate partner violence as a \u201csignificant public health concern in the state\u201d.
And the National Domestic Violence Hotline\u2019s website notes<\/a> that \u201cleaving is often the most dangerous period of time\u201d in terms of the potential for intimate partner violence.
Perennially high rates<\/a> of mass shootings in the US have prompted calls<\/a> from many in the country for more substantial gun control. But Congress over the years has been unable or unwilling to heed such calls, with lawmakers who support keeping firearms as accessible as possible often responding to deadly mass shootings with offered prayers rather than with legislative action.
Gabrielle Giffords, a former Democratic congresswoman from Arizona who survived a 2011 assassination attempt and is a gun violence prevention advocate, said in a statement on Sunday: \u201cAll of us should be outraged that we live in a country that routinely subjects our kids to such unimaginable violence.
\u201cOur leaders must act \u2013 now.\u201d
A statement on Monday from the non-profit Sandy Hook Promise, founded by the families of children killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting in Connecticut<\/a>, alluded to research that has established that gun violence was the US\u2019s leading<\/a> cause of death for teenagers and younger children. The organization\u2019s statement also referred<\/a> to a February 2025 study that found most children who die in mass shootings are killed by family members.
\u201cIt does not have to be this way,\u201d the Sandy Hook Promise statement said.<\/p>\n

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Gunman, identified as Shamar Elkins, fatally shot the children \u2013 including seven of his own \u2013 at two addressesMass shooting rampage in Louisiana leaves eight children dead and others woundedSign up for the Breaking News US newsletter emailLouisiana authorities have identified eight children \u2013 aged three to 11 \u2013 who were killed on Sunday during […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":208334,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-208333","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-us","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208333","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208333"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208333\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208334"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208333"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208333"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208333"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}