Shamar Elkins, Shreveport, Louisiana man shoots & kills 8 children, including all seven of his own kids, leaving the mothers of his two children, including wife, Shaneiqua ‘Pugh’ Elkins critically wounded. The pair had been going through a separation and were due in divorce court on Monday. According to the shooter’s parents the gunman had mental health issues, experienced suicidal thoughts with social media images showing a doting father along with hints of discord.
A Louisiana man and former National Guardsman is alleged to have gone on a ‘domestic’ mass shooting in Shreveport which left 8 children dead, seven of the man’s own children, along with critically wounding the two mothers with whom he shared the children with.
Shamar Elkins, 31, was killed following Sunday’s early morning rampage, according to Shreveport police. The gunman according to relatives had mental health problems and had recently expressed suicidal thoughts, and was embroiled in a separation case with his wife with whom he fathered four children with and was due in court on Monday.
Police said the children, three boys and five girls, ranging in age from about 3 to 14, were fatally shot in a domestic incident spanning two houses. Two women, including the children’s mothers were shot and critically wounded; and remained hospitalized.
According to local Shreveport police, Shamar Elkins reportedly led police on a high speed chase, killed eight of his children and shot his wife, Shaneiqua Elkins, before eventually being killed by responding police officers.#DomesticViolence #tragedy #evil #domesticviolence… pic.twitter.com/tHyJ2pZIU0
— Mrgunsngear (@Mrgunsngear) April 19, 2026
Shamar Elkins, Shreveport, Louisiana man guns down 8 kids, including all seven of his own kids
According to a news release from the Shreveport Police Department, Elkins first shot a woman, believed to be the mother of three of his children, on Harrison Street just before sunrise, before driving to another residence in the 300 block of West 79th Street, where Elkins is alleged to have shot and killed 8 children and injured a second woman, with whom he had fathered four of his seven children with.
After gunning down his victims, the suspect is reported to have carjacked a driver near the intersection of Linwood Avenue and West 79th Street.
Officers pursued the fleeing gunman into Bossier Parish, where they fatally shot Shamar Elkins. A total of 10 people were shot; two adult women survived head wounds, along with a 13-year-old boy who suffered a few broken bones while jumping from a roof as he sought to escape the gunman.
Shreveport dad critically injures wife, Shaneiqua who had started divorce proceedings against husband
One of the two women critically wounded was identified as Shamar Elkin’s wife, Shaneiqua ‘Pugh’ Elkins. Records show Elkins married his wife, 34-year-old about two years ago and that the couple had four children.
The Caddo Parish Coroner’s office identified the slain children as Jayla Elkins, 3; Shayla Elkins, 5; Kayla Pugh, 6; Layla Pugh, 7; Markaydon Pugh, 10; Sariahh Snow, 11; Khedarrion Snow, 6; and Braylon Snow, 5. All eight children were all found dead inside the second home, Elkins had descended on.
Police confirmed that seven of the victims were Elkins’ own children, while an eighth child was his nephew.
The majority of the victims were shot in the head while they were asleep, Shreveport Police Department spokesman Christopher Bordelon told NBC News.
One child was killed on the roof while trying to escape, police said.
Elkins allegedly shot his wife, Shaneiqua Elkins several times, including in the head and stomach. The woman along with the second mother (of three of the seven children) were reported fighting for their lives in hospital.
Shreveport shooter and wife were due in divorce court day before gun violence
Shamar Elkins and his wife were in the middle of separating and were due in divorce court on Monday, said Crystal Brown, a cousin of one of the wounded women.
Brown said the couple had been arguing about the separation before the shooting and that the husband had resisted the divorce.
‘He murdered his children,’ Brown said. ‘He shot his wife.’
Shaneiqua and Elkins had been together for 10 years and married on April 9, 2024 according to social media.
Shamar Elkins social media posts showed doting father
Images shared on social media leading up to the tragic domestic violence showed images of family outings and church trips, seemingly presenting the gunman as a devoted father.
In a April 5 post, Shamar Elkins stands outside a white-sided building, surrounded by several children in matching outfits, writing that he had a ‘wonderful time at church for the first time with all my kids,’ calling it a ‘blessed day.’ A more recent post, approximate one day before the shooting, shows him taking his ‘oldest on a lil 1 on 1 date’ as she eats a burger in a parked car.
But there were clues that suggested seething discontent.
Only one month before the massacre, Elkins responded to a viral social media prompt that read: ‘Dads If you could go back in time and have kids with a different woman but still have the same kids, would you do it?’
His reply was blunt. ‘Hell yehhhhhhhh I would.’
Stated an April 9 Facebook post, ‘Dear God, Today I ask You to help me guard my mind and my emotions. When negativity arises, remind me to say, ‘It does not belong to me, in the name of Jesus.”
Shreveport shooter had mental health issues and was struggling with suicidal thoughts
Earlier this month, Elkins had called his mother, Mahelia Elkins, and his stepfather, Marcus Jackson. Ms. Elkins and Mr. Jackson said in interviews that their son sounded despondent, the nytimes reported.
Mr. Elkins told them that he wanted to take his own life. He told Mr. Jackson that his wife wanted a divorce, and that he was drowning in ‘dark thoughts.’
‘I told him, ‘You can beat stuff, man. I don’t care what you’re going through, you can beat it,’’ Elkins stepfather told the nytimes. ‘Then I remember him telling me: ‘Some people don’t come back from their demons.”
The mother stated that her son worked for UPS and had previously served in the Army.
Ms. Elkins said she was not extremely close with her son. She had Mr. Elkins when she was a teenager and struggling with a crack cocaine addiction, so she left him to be raised by a family friend, Betty Walker. Ms. Elkins reconnected with her son more than a decade ago.
Former Army National Guardsman and prior criminal record
Elkins, a former member of the Louisiana Army National Guard, had previously served from 2013 to 2020 as a Signal Support System Specialist and Fire Support Specialist, according to military officials. He had no deployments and left the service as a private.
Records cited by CNN show Elkins also had a prior run-in with the law. Elkins was arrested in 2019 on a firearms case, according to a police report, after a man in a car pulled a gun on him.
He served 30 days in jail and was placed on supervised release.
Elkins also had a criminal conviction for driving while intoxicated in 2016.
There have been at least 114 mass shootings in the United States so far this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which defines a mass shooting as one in which four or more people are shot, not including the shooter.
One in 82 people are a victim of a violent crime in Shreveport, compared to one in 192 in the state of Louisiana, the report showed.
