Was there Outrage, Protest, and Demands for Accountability?

Insets (left to right): Vanta’jah Westmoreland and Nakia Piggee (Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office). Background: The Milwaukee, Wis., apartment where a 9-year-old girl was shot in 2024 (Google Maps).

–

Nine-year-old shot by another child after the two women watching them left four kids by themselves to go grocery shopping

–

A second woman from Wisconsin connected to the shooting of a 9-year-old girl will not serve prison time. Vanta’jah Westmoreland, 24, pleaded guilty on Friday to three counts of being an accomplice to child neglect and was sentenced to two years of probation.

The charges stem from an incident on November 8, 2024, in Milwaukee, where Westmoreland and 29-year-old Nakia Piggee—mother of the injured girl and Westmoreland’s girlfriend—left four children unattended in an apartment for about 40 minutes while they went grocery shopping. Among the children were a 9-year-old, an 8-year-old, a 4-year-old, and a 2-year-old with disabilities.

After Piggee called 911 to report the shooting, police arrived and found the 9-year-old lying face-down in the living room with a gunshot wound to her upper right back. She was conscious and able to speak. When questioned, she first described the shooter as a male and pointed to the 4-year-old boy in the kitchen. As she began to gurgle and cough, an officer applied a chest seal before she was taken to the hospital, where she survived.

Westmoreland told investigators that a 16-year-old neighbor had taken the firearm from the apartment to prevent anyone from getting into trouble. During a protective sweep, officers found the home cluttered with food, dirty clothes, cigarette ash, and plastic bottles.

In the bedroom, they discovered liquor bottles, ash trays, and diapers. Inside a crib was the 2-year-old, wearing casts on both arms, with a feeding tube and oxygen support. Nearby, on the floor between the crib and a soiled queen mattress, police found a 9 mm Hornady Luger casing, a bloody T-shirt showing signs of a bullet impact, and a bloodstained blanket. The weapon—a 9 mm HiPoint—was later recovered at the neighbor’s apartment, wrapped in black sweatpants.

When questioned, the 4-year-old said “aunt Kiki,” a nickname for Piggee, kept the gun under the bed. He also told his mother that the 8-year-old girl had fired it. She told police she took the gun from him after he found it beneath the mattress, and it discharged while in her hands. When asked how she was holding it, she appeared nervous and paused before shifting blame to the younger boy.

According to the criminal complaint, no firearm safety devices such as trigger locks or safes were found in the home. Piggee later claimed the gun belonged to

Westmoreland and was stored under the mattress, but she said she had forgotten it was there.

In April 2025, local Fox affiliate WITI reported that Piggee pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor counts of child neglect and received a two-year probation sentence.

–

The post 9-year-old shot by another child after the 2 women watching them left 4 kids by themselves to go grocery shopping first appeared on Law & Crime.