He was hit with paintballs. He responded with bullets - and killed a toddler, Ga. police say
Three-year-old T'Rhigi Diggs slept in the backseat of his mother's car as she traveled through southeast Atlanta. It was Easter Sunday, a cool, clear night, and Rashonda Craig was taking her son home.
Suddenly there was a gunshot. T'Rhigi was screaming.
"I didn’t know my baby was shot, I’m thinking he just woke up," his mother told WSB-TV.
She told police she had seen another car drive near her and point what looked like a paintball gun at her car, but then heard a real gunshot. She told the station she thought the sound had merely startled T'Rhigi awake.
“My baby was asleep, my baby was asleep,” Craig told WXIA. “I saw the paint gun first. I kind of got scared and I couldn't move and then they just shot my baby. I heard a gunshot. "
T'Rhigi was rushed to the hospital but succumbed to a gunshot wound, according to WXIA. He had turned 3 only days before, OCGNews reported.
"Please tell me who did this to my baby. I want justice for my baby. My baby didn’t deserve this. Please help me," his mother pleaded, WSB-TV reported.
Police had few leads. After investigating, the Dekalb County police said the shooting was not a drive-by at all. Instead, the bullet appeared to have come from a nearby gas station, DeKalb Police Chief James Conroy told Crossroads News. Police released surveillance video of the store that may have shown witnesses.
It didn't look like any kind of targeted attack either, police told WSB-TV. Instead, it seemed T'Rhigi and his mother were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.
"But this is a 3-year old. This is a 3-year-old that didn’t have anything to do with anything. So this is very important that people come forward to help us out in this case,” DeKalb Lt. Rod Bryant told the station.
There was one thing — the mention of a paintball gun. Atlanta (and several other cities across the nation) had seen a string of paintball attacks over the last few weeks, apparently inspired, at least in part, by Atlanta-based rapper 21 Savage.
21 Savage started the "Guns down, paintballs up" movement as an alternative to using real bullets on the streets, Fox 6 reported — but in this case, it seemed the opposite had happened. The rapper paid for T'Rhigi's funeral on April 8, according to the AJC.
“So it’s ironic that she saw a paintball gun, and the rash of paintball gun, and the rash of paintball going on, so yes, we are looking at that also,” Dekalb Police Lt. Rod Bryant told WSB-TV.
After two weeks of investigating, police finally arrested a 15-year-old and charged him with murder, according to CBS 46.
"The loss of T’Rhigi is tragic and senseless. It is my hope that this arrest will bring some sense of comfort and closure to his family," DeKalb Police Chief James Conroy said, according to OCGNews.
In court, a police detective testified that a group of people had driven past the gas station and fired paintballs at the shooter and several others, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. In response, the detective said the juvenile grabbed a gun and fired actual bullets back, missing the paintballers and hitting T'Rhigi instead, the AJC reported.
The shooter has been charged with murder. But T'Rhigi's mother is still just trying to cope with the loss.
“It feels like I’m just lost right now,” she told the AJC.
This story was originally published May 1, 2018 at 9:32 AM with the headline "He was hit with paintballs. He responded with bullets - and killed a toddler, Ga. police say."