Justin Gabriel Andries was a 14-year-old Black boy who died on May 14, 2019, in Kansas City, Missouri, after a gun went off inside his family’s Northland apartment in the early hours of the morning.
Police were called to the Vivion Oaks Apartments near Northeast 50th Terrace and North Oak Trafficway around 3:30 a.m., where first responders found Justin with a gunshot wound and tried to save him with CPR, but he was pronounced dead at the scene.
Investigators said two juveniles had been handling a firearm when it discharged, and the shooting was described as accidental.
In the days that followed, Justin’s mother, Andrea Andries, told reporters the gun had been brought into the home after being taken from a car, and that Justin and his older brother had been posing for photos with it for social media. She said the weapon was being waved around and the trigger was pulled—believed to be “empty” until a round still in the chamber fired. After he was hit, Justin managed to run up two flights of stairs toward his mother’s bedroom before he collapsed.
Authorities indicated other family members were inside the residence at the time, asleep, and that the people in the home were cooperating as detectives worked to understand exactly what happened. Public reporting around the case described the investigation in terms of an accidental shooting and did not report any announced arrests or filed criminal charges tied to Justin’s death.
