Bullet hits 9-year-old boy in drive-by shooting

Dontrell Darling transported to Jackson Memorial Hospital

MIAMI – A bullet hit the face of a 9-year-old boy as he slept inside his Liberty City home early Friday morning.

A gunman inside a light-colored sport utility vehicle fired at a house in the 800 block of Northwest 55th Terrace about 3 a.m., police say.

"It just kept going and going and going and going -- it didn't stop," said neighbor Albert Doyle Jr. "I flipped off the bed. I was scared. I didn't know who they was aiming for."

The boy, identified by family members as Dontrell Darling, was transported to Jackson Memorial Hospital in serious condition after a bullet hit him in the jaw. His aunt said he underwent surgery and was expected to recover.

"I told him, I said you're a real soldier because I don't understand, I mean, from the damage of looking at it, his face, everything's split open but he stayed calm," said his aunt Shauntae, who declined to give Local 10 her last name.

Nearly two dozen bullets hit the front of the house and two cars parked outside it. Seven others, including four children, were home at the time of the shooting.

"Whoever these guys are, they're looking for someone to kill them and they probably assumed that he was here," added Shauntae.

Neighbors said the sound of gunfire is common.

"Sadly to say, weekly," said Albert Doyle Sr. "My wife has been on me to move for the last five years but I grew up here and it's tough to do."

"It's not like back in Vietnam where you're armed and you can shoot back," added Earl Chandler.

Anyone with information on the shooting is asked to call Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers at 305-471-TIPS.