“Please don’t hurt my mommy!” Little Alexis Goggins screamed as she jumped into a hail of gunfire, using her tiny body as a shield to protect her mother from an enraged gunman.
When the bullets stopped flying, the brave 7-year-old, who is disabled, had been shot six times.
The terrifying drama began shortly before midnight, Dec. 1, when single mom Selietha Parker, 30, of Detroit, her daughter Alexis and family friend Aisha Ford, 29, were taken hostage by Selietha’s ex-boyfriend, four-time convicted felon Kelvin Tillie.
“He was mad at her for breaking up with him,” said Detroit Public Schools official Marvin Bodley, who is speaking on behalf of the distraught mother.
Police say Tillie got into the back seat of Aisha’s 1998 Ford Expedition with Alexis, while Selietha was in the front passenger seat. He then ordered Aisha to drive to a deserted spot outside of the city called Six Mile Road.
“He looked like he was enraged and didn’t care what he did. I knew if we went to Six Mile he would kill us,” said Aisha.
Aisha told Tillie she was low on gas, and they stopped at a service station. Aisha went inside — and immediately called 911.
“Tillie saw Aisha on the phone and guessed that she was calling the police, and he became enraged,” said Bodley. “He said to Selietha: ‘I am going to kill you’ — and he began firing.”
The first bullet glanced off Selietha’s head, and as she turned around to try to grab the gun, Tillie shot her a second time in the right arm, explained Bodley.
“At this point, Alexis sprang out of her seat and got between them so he couldn’t shoot her mother and she begged him: ‘Please don’t hurt my mommy!'”
But the callous gunman continued shooting. And little Alexis, a first-grader, was shot six times with Tillie’s 9 mm semiautomatic handgun — three times in the head and three times in the body.
“What a courageous, courageous little girl. She was prepared to sacrifice her own life to save her mother,” said Bodley. “Selietha said if Alexis hadn’t jumped between them she’s sure she would have been killed.”
Doctors operated and removed a bullet from Alexis’ brain, but a bullet that went through her right eye may leave the child practically blind. A stroke she suffered as an infant caused her to lose most of the sight in her left eye. But aside from her vision, Alexis is expected to make a full recovery.
“Here is a handicapped child who can barely make it on her own, yet she always puts others first. She is an inspiration to all of us,” said Bodley.
“Her mother calls her a gift from heaven.”
Tillie is now in jail facing numerous felony charges. If convicted, he faces life in prison.
