A 14-year-old Upper Darby youth has been charged and jailed in the gunshot death of a 14-year-old girl on Springton Road in the township.
Nazim Lar, of the first block of Powell Lane, was charged with third-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter and related offenses and denied bail after arraignment Friday night by District Judge David R. Griffin.
The arraignment paperwork states that he was taken to the George W. Hill Correctional Facility.
He was charged in the death Thursday of the girl, who suffered a gunshot wound to the forehead, and was rushed to Penn Presbyterian Medical Center, but lifesaving efforts were unsuccessful.
Police say one witness in the house reported that after they heard the gunshot, Lar exclaimed, “Oh my God, I just killed her!”
The police affidavit stated that Lar and at least one other person knew that the victim’s mother kept a handgun in the house, and they retrieved it. The group had a half day of school and all walked to the victim’s house. The victim texted her mother to let the mother know that she was home.
The victim’s name was not provided by police.
Police gave this account:
Officers responded to the home in the 100 block of Springton Road at 1:40 p.m. on Thursday, May 14, after a person in the house, a witness, called to report he heard a shot and a female scream. That witness said two teens had run from the house.
Patrol officers observed that the rear door of the residence was wide open and they went in “and cleared the residence.”
One of the officers found the victim, a Black female, in the rear, second-floor bedroom. She was on the bed on her back, suffering from a gunshot wound to the head.
There was also a pink handgun with a black slide on the bed to the left of the victim. She was pronounced dead at 2:28 p.m. at the hospital.
The victim’s mother was transported to the hospital.
Through investigation, police identified three subjects who fled from the rear of the residence.
After a search warrant was obtained, police identified the weapon as a SCCY CPX-2 handgun with a black slide. There was no magazine inside of the handgun, and a fired cartridge casing was jammed in its chamber, preventing the slide from closing.
Also Thursday, detectives met with Lar and his guardian at township police headquarters.
Lar told detectives that he and others had walked to the victim’s house, and admitted that they took the mother’s handgun from her bedroom closet.
Lar stated that he and the witness retrieved the handgun and went into the second-floor bathroom, and that the other boy “inserted a magazine into the handgun, racked the slide to the rear, and removed the magazine.”
Then Lar took the firearm and both went into the victim’s bedroom, with Lar sitting next to her on the bed.
Police say Lar stated, “I didn’t know there was one in the chamber and I usually like, even if I had a gun, I usually check ’cause YouTube safety always tells to check if there is a bullet in the chamber.”
Lar stated that the victim grabbed his right arm and placed the barrel of the handgun against her forehead. Lar stated that the victim grabbed his right index finger, placed it on the trigger, and the firearm discharged, striking the victim in the head.
Lar and the witness ran out of the room, then returned to retrieve another witness, then all fled the residence.
Police interviews with the other witnesses gleaned some other details:
• The entire group was in the room with a couple of them sitting on the edge of the bed watching TV and the shooting occurred behind them on the bed.
• One witness said Lar later retold the story of how he held a gun to the victim’s head.
• Lar made a call after they fled the house, telling someone, “I just killed Kasiyah!”
• It wasn’t the first time Lar and others had played around with the mother’s firearm. On another occasion, Lar and one of the witnesses pulled the trigger and pretended to shoot the victim, but her friend told them to stop that because the victim was getting upset. There was no time frame applied to that episode.
So far, only Lar has been charged.