A family in Flint, Michigan, isn’t staying silent after their 9-year-old daughter was shot and killed. Tyhari Knox was asleep in her bedroom when bullets began to rain down upon her family’s home. As the bullets pierced through the home’s windows and siding, the little girl didn’t stand a chance of surviving. In the end, hundreds of bullet shell casings were found at the crime scene. Sadly, police have no leads about who may be responsible.
As they mourn, her parents, along with other community and city leaders, are coming together to use her death as a call for peace and to stop the gun violence ravaging their city.
The shooting happened in the middle of the night.
The shooting took place around 2 a.m. May 8, 2026, WJRT reported. In addition to Tyhari, a 14-year-old girl also was critically injured in the incident. Police initially found 99 bullet shell casings at the scene, the outlet reported.
“We know a 9-year-old will not wake up the next morning, she will never see a sweet 16, she will never graduate from high school, she will never go to the prom, and a life was taken because of senseless gun violence,” shared Flint City Councilwoman Tonya Burns, who represents the ward where the shooting happened.
The Flint Police Department is still investigating the double shooting and altogether recovered 200 shell casings from the scene, WJRT reported in a follow-up story. According to Sgt. Paul Spann, no arrests have been made in connection with the shooting. A motive is also still unknown.
“The case is definitely being treated with the highest of priorities, and we are dedicating investigative resources to make sure that we are able to identify those responsible to bring them to justice,” Spann shared.
The girl’s parents aren’t staying quiet about their daughter’s death.
At the time of the shooting, her parents, Tyraye Knox and Alexis Smith were downstairs in the home watching television, along with three other kids who weren’t hurt, WJRT reported.
“I don’t know why they would do that,” Smith said of the shooting. “It was unnecessary, there is no one here, but us and kids, it’s a house of kids, asleep, asleep.” According to her, Tyhari loved TikTok, singing, and dancing.
The parents are imploring people to come forward and share any information they may have about the shooting that broke their family and destroyed their home.
“Speak up, somebody, if it’s your brother, cousin, uncle whoever it is, turn them in because as long as you are keeping them, helping them, you are going to go to jail too,” she said, per WJRT.
“All of this gun violence, this shooting back and forth, it has to stop, now, it’s a young crowd doing this, this stupidity,” Knox added. “We have to come together, my daughter is gone.”
Smith has started a GoFundMe campaign to raise money for her daughter’s funeral, as well as financial support for the family as they deal with the unexpected loss.
Tyhari’s death is bringing the community together to fight gun violence in Flint.
As the family continued to speak out, Knox called the people who shot his young daughter “cowards,” WNEM reported.
“What happened to go get in that grass or something, go fight?” he asked. “Now they want to come shoot people house up at different times of the day and night and be knowing people got kids at their house.”
Burns called out the killing as a turning point for the city.
“This was not just another shooting — this was the execution of innocence,” she said, per WNEM. “A 9-year-old little girl was asleep in her own bed when gunfire tore through her home. Mothers throughout Flint are terrified. Families are traumatized. Enough is enough.
“We cannot continue normalizing children being murdered in our neighborhoods,” Burns added. “I stand with this family not simply as a councilwoman, but as an advocate and a human being demanding action and accountability.”
“We have to come together. My daughter is gone. And there’s so many more people out here that have lost their kids because of the same thing,” Smith added.
