{"id":785462,"date":"2026-05-10T01:07:39","date_gmt":"2026-05-10T01:07:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/785462\/"},"modified":"2026-05-10T01:07:39","modified_gmt":"2026-05-10T01:07:39","slug":"8-children-murdered-in-cold-blood-by-monster-dad-laid-to-rest-in-emotional-service","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/785462\/","title":{"rendered":"8 children murdered in cold blood by monster dad laid to rest in emotional service"},"content":{"rendered":"

A crowd of heart-broken mourners bid a final, tearful farewell Saturday to eight children killed in a predawn mass shooting<\/a> carried out last month in Shreveport, La., by the father of most of the victims.<\/p>\n

Led by a procession of grieving families and eight white caskets, the service at Summer Grove Baptist Church centered on a raw sermon from Pastor Kim Burrell, who reminded those searching for answers that even in the face of the unthinkable, \u201cGod is still on the throne.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pastor Kim Burrell, of Summer Grove Baptist Church. AP<\/p>\n

\u201cTo ask the question, \u2018Why is this fair, God? How could you, Lord? he\u2019s still God,\u201d said Kim Burrell, who is also a gospel singer, to mourners.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe same God that healed you from the stuff that you don\u2019t want to tell nobody about. But he is a God that doesn\u2019t have to give us all the clues. Just know that he makes no mistakes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shamar Elkins, father seven of the of the victims<\/a>, shot the children with an assault rifle on April 11. He managed to acquire the weapon despite a previous felony firearms conviction. His wife and another woman were wounded. The other child killed was a cousin of the victims.<\/p>\n

Elkins died after fleeing in a police pursuit.<\/p>\n

The funeral\u2019s pamphlet honored each of the children \u2014 whose ages ranged from 3 to 11 \u2014 with their nicknames and descriptions of their personalities: \u201ca sweet and loving heart,\u201d and \u201cbright, intelligent bold and full of love.\u201d<\/p>\n

Follow the latest updates on the Louisiana father who killed 8 children in Shreveport shooting:<\/p>\n

Other speakers included Shreveport Councilwoman Tabatha Taylor, who emphasized that there \u201care no words sufficient to ease this pain.\u201d Councilman James Green asked attendees to utilize the funeral as a \u201ccelebration\u201d of the victims\u2019 lives.<\/p>\n

Shreveport Mayor Tom Arceneaux expressed condolences on behalf of the city, and said that residents should \u201chonor hem by carrying forward the gentleness, joy and love they so freely shared.\u201d<\/p>\n

Facebook\/Shamar Elkins<\/p>\n

Louisiana Governor Tom Landry echoed Mayor Arceneaux, saying \u201cThey were full of promise and found joy in the simples things, such as dancing, playing outside and sharing laughter with family and friends.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTheir futures were bright and held great promise.\u201d<\/p>\n

Churchgoers applauded the speakers, and the victims\u2019 names were read aloud and shown throughout the service. White flowers and ferns adorned the caskets.<\/p>\n

The funeral for the eight children featured state, federal and local elected officials. AP<\/p>\n

Shamar Elkins, who killed eight children at a residence in Shreveport, Louisiana. via REUTERS<\/p>\n

Federal investigators have since indicted two men in connection with the case. Charles Ford<\/a> was charged with being a felon in possession of a firearm and providing Elkins with the assault-style rifle used in the shooting.<\/p>\n

Michael Mayence<\/a> was also indicted on firearm charges after police recovered multiple guns from his home. The investigation is ongoing.<\/p>\n

With Post wires<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A crowd of heart-broken mourners bid a final, tearful farewell Saturday to eight children killed in a predawn…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":785463,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,245,19883,353,16482,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,67,586,132,5230,68,1154,2969],"class_list":["post-785462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-america","tag-children","tag-funeral","tag-louisiana","tag-mass-shootings","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-newyork","tag-newyorkcity","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-us-news","tag-usa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116547606519204912","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/785462","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=785462"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/785462\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/785463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=785462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=785462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=785462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}