Boy, 15, Sentenced in Fatal Shooting of Best Friend

A 15-year-old boy who was convicted of involuntary manslaughter for accidentally shooting his best friend to death in April was sentenced Thursday to the California Youth Authority.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Shannon Presby said that the teenager, a suspected member of the Crenshaw Mafia Bloods, had bought the gun on the street for $25 and that he and Denrel Martell Hudggins, 15, were checking it out when it went off, shooting Hudggins in the face.

“They were goofing around,” Presby said. “These are the tragic things that happen when children play with guns.”

Hudggins’ parents lived in Los Angeles, but he had apparently run away and a Van Nuys woman had taken him in weeks earlier, Presby said.

She left him home alone while she went to work, but told him not to have any friends over.

On April 9, he invited three friends to the Valerio Street apartment to play video games. The defendant, a childhood friend, was among the visitors. After Hudggins was shot, his friends ran away. But the defendant returned moments later, called 911 and tried to help him, Presby said.

He left again before the police arrived, then turned himself in to authorities.