KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Jackson County’s top prosecutor announced Sunday a Belton couple is charged after bringing their kids to a drug deal Thursday night.
Their two-year-old daughter was shot and now she is fighting for her life in the hospital.
Prosecutor Jean Peters-Baker said, “There’s just no winners in this one.”
Police responded to a shooting call just after 8 p.m. Thursday in the parking lot of Church’s Chicken off Gregory and Prospect. Officers pulled up and found a man shot to death, lying in the parking lot next to a van.
“The parents roll up with their two children in a van and then a third adult individual gets into the vehicle with them,” said Baker.
Officers say 28-year-old Darrell Roberson and his 25-year-old girlfriend Roselynn Kuntz were there with their two girls — two and three years old.
“The children, a two-year-old and a three-year-old, are literally caught in the crossfire inside this vehicle,” Baker said.
Roberson told police he was there to sell a pound of marijuana and that he had two loaded handguns. Court records say the 19-year-old buyer, who went by ‘D,’ got into the van.
“Every adult inside their vehicle is armed with a gun and ready to go to war,” Baker said.
The two-year-old shot in the head, and her parents were hit as well. Roselynn Kuntz was shot in the back and entered the courtroom in a wheelchair on Monday. Darrell Roberson Jr., has a shoulder wound. The 19-year-old died at the scene. The only one who wasn’t hurt was the three-year-old girl.
Prosecutors said they are tired of this. Baker said maybe people will see it’s time to have discussions that matter and actually create change.
“If we wanted to have a real debate about gun violence, we should do it in a way that we could look at these children and explain to them, this is the very, very best policy we can come up with for you to keep you safe,” Baker said.
Darrell Roberson, Jr., 28, and Roselynn Kuntz, 25, each face one count of felony abuse or neglect of a child and two felony counts of endangering the welfare of a child creating substantial risk.
Prosecutors haven’t released any information about whether charges will come out for the death of 19-year-old, but they say the case is still open and they’re still investigating.
