March 23, 2026
A South Memphis mother is speaking out after her 7-year-old was robbed at gunpoint.
The mother of a 7-year-old boy who was recently robbed at gunpoint for $10 is speaking out over the rising violence on the streets of South Memphis.
The 7-year-old and his mother, who spoke anonymously to FOX 13 due to threats, said he was walking home from a park with friends on Wednesday, March 18, when a gunman confronted them, and took two $5 bills from his pocket before fleeing.
“When we were walking over here, they was behind us talking, then they ran up on us, made us fall, and tripped us,” the 7-year-old boy said. “Then they went into our pockets and got all the money we had..” The boy was unhurt.
The mother said she wasn’t home when it happened, but her heart dropped when she got the call that someone had pulled a gun on her son.
”Like I have a daughter that is 16; our son is 13. And I have never been through nothing like this, ever,” the boy’s mother said. “And since we’ve been staying over in this area, it’s been nothing but bad things happening to me and my kids.”
The boy’s mother says the incident was the breaking point, and she’s now doing everything she can to leave the neighborhood, located on Vaal Street off Castex. Another woman told Fox 13 her daughter was shot there two years ago. Both women say a group of older teens has long terrorized the area, and the mother believes one of them was responsible for robbing her son at gunpoint.
”It is not safe over here; these parents up over here, they don’t care how their kids react to things, or they don’t care what their kids out here doing,” the boy’s mother said. “So I’m trying to get my kids away from all of this. I can’t take it no more.”
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