9-year-old facing murder charges after ‘shooting mother’

A nine-year-old boy is facing murder charges after allegedly shooting his adoptive mother dead.

Pauline Randol, 51, died from gunshot wounds, with court documents alleging her son pulled the trigger on his father’s hunting rifle.

According to The Detroit News, the boy, who has ADHD, was known in the area to be troublesome, with Randol’s biological daughter telling the outlet: “She was so scared she was raising the next serial killer.”

Neighbours also told Fox17 they weren’t surprised to hear what he had allegedly done.

“My wife and I both, when we heard that the woman was shot, we both looked at each other and said 'I bet it was him,'” neighbour Joseph Lancaster said Wednesday to FOX 17.

“The little boy, because I have grandkids. I have one the same age and I've got smaller ones. And he would stand in the tree line over there and point his BB gun at him and shoot at them.”

The family told Detroit News that at a hearing on Tuesday, the unnamed boy – who has been charged with open murder and felony firearms – was looking around the courtroom, wondering where his mother was.

Randol had been looking after the boy since he was a baby, and legally adopted him three years ago.

He is ordered to undertake a competency evaluation, in order to determine what to do as he is too young to know what is right and wrong.

“It's just crazy -- scary," Lancaster said.

“You know, he could have shot anybody around here.”