NORFOLK, Va. (WAVY) — Amir Burnette’s mother described him as loving, caring, genuine.
“This is what I told my baby,” Ny’Shell Traynham said. “I don’t want you staying away from me because you don’t know how these households are.”
Traynham said her son begged her to let him stay over on Wyngate Drive with friends.
Sunday afternoon, police showed up reports of a gunshot and found 14-year-old Amir with a life-threatening wound.
The 14-year-old victim, an eighth grader at Norview Middle School, was taken to the hospital, where he later died.
Detectives have not released additional information in the case as police have provided few details, but at this time they don’t believe the shooting was intentional.
A Norfolk man, meanwhile, has been charged with involuntary manslaughter and reckless handling of a firearm after Burnette was fatally shot.
Police said 27-year-old Albert J. Sutton was detained at the scene after officers responded to the 5300 block of Wyngate Drive in the Crown Point neighborhood around 12:36 p.m.
Court documents obtained by WAVY state “the accused stated he did not mean for the firearm to go off and it was a mistake.”
His bond was denied on Tuesday, Sept. 12.
Traynham told us what she knows about Sutton.
“He was the uncle to one of the boys,” she said. “They told me he wasn’t allowed around them. They said he barged his way into the house, and all they heard were shots fired.”
Mom said her son knew he had been hit.
“And my baby said, ‘I can’t feel my body,'” Traynham said through tears. “He said ‘I can’t feel my body,’ and my baby said ‘I can’t feel my body.'”
Traynham said she didn’t know any of the adults in the townhome.
10 On Your Side went to the door, but there was no answer.
Then, a man pulled up in a van and said he lived there, but then took off.
“Bad blood with someone in the house,” Traynham said. “My son had nothing to do with it. He was the one that got hit in the mix of it, whatever was going on in that home.”
For Traynham, it’s a deep pain you cannot describe.
“I don’t know how to tell my baby girl he is never coming back,” she said. “My baby didn’t harm a fly. My baby was humble. He was all about his family.”
You want to hear a mother’s pain?
Listen to Traynham’s voice filled with emotion as tears run across her cheeks.
“My baby would give you the shirt of his back, the shoes off his feet, my baby — he was my baby, he was my joy.”
Sadly, she knows that pain too well, the sudden loss of her beloved 14-year-old Amir.
“Anyone who came across my baby can’t do anything but love my baby because he gave off the good positive energy,” she said. “My baby was innocent. He slept, drank, ate football.”
Amir was one week into eighth grade at Norview Middle School, preparing to play in the school’s first football game Thursday.
But it’s not to be.
Sadly, instead, it’s another young person killed.
“My baby was excited,” Traynham said. “My baby wanted a change in his life. I moved here to better my baby’s living conditions.
Part of the story we don’t know yet — Sutton has not been charged with murder, but with involuntary manslaughter. The family claims Amir was shot in the back.
“I want him to be charged with first-degree murder,” his mother said. “When he comes to the house, Amir is 14-years-old and he’s a 27-year-old man. Amir was an innocent baby that he never had no beef with.”
What is Traynham’s message to Sutton?
“I hope you can feel my pain,” she said. “My baby is never coming back, and you need to be held accountable for what you did to my baby. In the end, no matter what this man gets, I’m never getting my baby back.”
If you have any information about this case, you can submit an anonymous tip by calling 1-888-LOCK-U-UP, downloading the P3 tips app to a mobile device, or visiting www.P3tips.com and submitting a tip.