MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – Students at Van E. Blanton Elementary School headed back to school Monday, after one of their classmates was killed in a drive-by shooting over the weekend.
"He was a nice kid and we used to play games together all the time," London Destine said about his first grade classmate King Carter.
"My niece, when she heard about it, she broke down and started crying because that was her friend," Dquailla Dunkley said.
Police said King, 6, was shot outside his apartment complex at 1225 NW 103rd Lane Saturday afternoon.
His father, Santonio Carter, said he ran outside and found his son "in the corner with his eyes open."
"He had a smile as wide as a king would have, and his name was fitting for his personality and that smile. That face will be sorely missed," principal Tangela Goa said.
"He greeted the principal with a hug every day. He greeted his teacher with a question. Why you always smiling? Why do you wear a jacket? It's hot outside. Do you have a boyfriend? King won't be asking those questions anymore," Miami-Dade County Public Schools superintendent Alberto Carvalho said.
Carvalho helped welcome King's classmates back to school Monday before stopping by a memorial at the spot where King was killed, just a block away from the elementary school.
"We should not be making coffins this small as those we make," Carvalho said.
Miami-Dade police said two people opened fired and a third drove them away. They said King was playing outside his apartment when a stray bullet hit him.
"Do you ever get scared playing outside after knowing what happened to him?" Local 10 News reporter Erica Rakow asked London.
"Yep," London said.
Freddy Ramirez, the assistant director at Miami-Dade police, sat down with Local 10 News reporter Hatzel Vela to talk about the realities of the violence in the community and their approach to policing.
"Our goal here is to build off the relationship that we built with this community to help us bring to justice those individuals that maliciously and heinously killed a 6-year-old boy in our community," Ramirez said.
But police said there are challenges as many in the community fear for their lives so they don’t come forward.
"We want to assure them that we have their back," Ramirez said. "This is a problem that can only be solved together with the community."
Anyone with information regarding the shooting is asked to call Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers at 305-471-8477. A $26,000 reward is being offered for information that leads to an arrest.