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Driver sentenced to 30 years in fatal shooting of 7-year-old Jazmine Barnes in Texas

Jazmine was killed in 2018 after a gunman who mistakenly thought he was shooting at a rival opened fire at the vehicle she was in.

The driver of a car from which another man fired the fatal shot that killed a 7-year-old Texas girl in 2018 was sentenced to 30 years in prison Thursday, prosecutors said.

Jazmine Barnes was fatally shot Dec. 30 near Houston after the gunman and the driver apparently thought the car she was in belonged to a rival, the Harris County District Attorney’s Office said.

Jazmine had been in the car with her mother and three sisters.

Jazmine Barnes, 7, was fatally shot in a Walmart parking lot in Harris County, Texas, on Dec. 30, 2018.
Jazmine Barnes, 7, was fatally shot in a Walmart parking lot in Harris County, Texas, on Dec. 30, 2018. Family photo / Family photo

The driver, Eric Black, 23, pleaded guilty to murder this year.

The gunman, Larry Woodruffe, 27, was sentenced to life in prison without parole in April after a jury convicted him of capital murder.

The two men did not know they had shot a child until they saw it on the news later, prosecutors have said.

Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg called Jazmine’s death “a tragic and heartbreaking example of needless and pointless gun violence.”

Black agreed to testify against Woodruffe as part of the plea agreement, which capped his possible prison term at 35 years, prosecutors said.

Black testified at trial that they thought the car belonged to someone else and that Woodruffe fired nine times, NBC affiliate KPRC of Houston has reported.