GUILTY MS - Brayden Barksdale, 4, shot to death, Lowndes County, 19 Jan 2015

Coroner Greg Merchant told WCBI that he had suspicions about the shooting from the beginning and that there was no way it was an accident.

An autopsy was done Tuesday morning at the state crime lab. The sheriff’s department was not saying much about the investigation, but did tell the TV station that the shooting was not point blank, which likely led them to conclude the child did not shoot himself.

Click to expand...

Family of four-year-old Brayden Barksdale, the child killed at his Sobley Road home in January 2015, had one question for the man who shot him: why?

It was the question Barksdale's aunt, Crystal Powell, asked Patrick Chambers at his hearing in Lowndes County Circuit Court Friday morning when he entered a guilty plea to capital murder in the commission of child abuse.

"Every day I wake up and I wonder what Brayden would be like today," Powell said when reading her victim's impact statement to the court. "... He was just a baby. If you have any good in your heart and any conscience at all, tell us why you pulled that trigger."

Circuit Court Judge Jim Kitchens sentenced Chambers to life in prison without the possibility of parole, a fact which Powell said gave her "a small amount of pleasure."

"I hope you cannot sleep at night because of what you've done," she said.

Click to expand...