Makayla died Sunday morning after her 5-year-old brother shot her while playing with a handgun,

Michelle Vensko went to Wal-Mart on Sunday to buy her 4-year-old daughter, Makayla Booher, one last outfit: pink silk pajamas and little house slippers.
Makayla died Sunday morning after her 5-year-old brother shot her while playing with a handgun, police said.Vensko wants her daughter to be dressed in her favorite color when she is buried."That's my snuggle bunny," she said.Vensko, 34, and the little girl's father, James Michael Booher, 24, were grief-stricken Sunday after child's play turned deadly.Officers were dispatched to the 6000 block of Massachusetts Avenue at 10:03 a.m."They arrived a minute later to find 4-year-old Makayla Booher on the floor of an upstairs bedroom with a gunshot wound to the head," Sgt. Matthew Mount, spokesman for the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department, said in a written statement. "A semi-automatic handgun was on the floor outside the doorway."Officers performed chest compressions on the girl until paramedics arrived, but she was pronounced dead at the scene.According to police, the brother had pulled a chair up to a bookcase in the downstairs living room and taken his father's handgun from the top shelf. There was no magazine in the pistol, but a round was in the chamber."The 5-year-old took the gun upstairs to play, and there pointed the gun at his sister and pulled the trigger," the statement said.
The Indianapolis Star generally does not identify juveniles in such cases.Booher has the gun because he works as a security officer.He was home at the time of the shooting, as were a 14-year-old stepsister of the two younger children and an aunt. All three children lived with Booher, who goes by the name Mike.Vensko and Booher, who are not married, are separated but still involved with each other.
"I didn't believe it," Vensko said in an interview hours after police took her to the home. "I was standing there, in front of all of this, and you see this on the news all the time, but you never think it's going to hit home -- ever."
Police were investigating the shooting and had made no arrests by late Sunday."The possibility of neglect charges exist, but that has not been determined yet," said Matthew Symons, spokesman for Marion County Prosecutor Carl Brizzi.Vensko said she knew Booher had a gun for his job but said he had always been careful with it.Vensko wasn't allowed to see Makayla at the scene, but she was able to see the other two children before they were placed in the care of Child Protective Services.
"He seems like he's doing OK," Vensko said of Makayla's brother. "He told me what happened, what he did. But I know he doesn't understand. He doesn't know Makayla is gone."Makayla was born prematurely on Feb. 17, 2004, at Riley Hospital for Children, at 26 weeks and six days -- far short of the normal 40 weeks of gestation. She weighed 1 pound, 14 ounces and was just 14 inches long.
"Makayla beat all the odds stuck in front of her," Vensko said. "She wasn't supposed to walk, or ever roll over. But Makayla was walking and talking. She was outdoing any 4-year-old you've met."
Makayla underwent 15 surgeries, the last one a year ago. The blue-eyed blonde remained small for her age but was otherwise developing well.
"She would have been beautiful," Vensko said. "If you've seen those pictures, where little girls are dressed in white dresses and have angel wings on them, that's what she looks like."
Vensko dressed Makayla in a girly style, but when it came to playtime, she was one of the boys.
"She was always out in the yard getting dirty," she said. "Anywhere you found dirt or a water puddle, that's where she was."
Booher said Makayla enjoyed playing with toy telephones that made fun ringing sounds. She often pretended she was talking to her father on the phone.
"She was my miracle baby," he said, his voice faltering. "I tried very, very hard to keep her healthy and safe. I love her very, very much. I'm going to miss her."

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