A bunch of kids in a house with a gun.

For 14-year-old Lecent Ross, who was over at a friend’s place only a stone’s throw from home, all it took was a single shot. Police don’t know who pulled the trigger.

From the Jamestown public-housing complex near Martin Grove Rd. and Finch Ave W, Ross was rushed to hospital around 10:30 a.m. and pronounced dead less than an hour later.

Her aunt, Maureen Moss, said she was close with more than one of the four siblings — three teenage boys and a ten-year-old girl — who lived at a nearby unit, which was cordoned off by police tape for most of the day Thursday.

“They went to school together. They knew each other from the neighbourhood,” said Moss.

“It’s a total freak accident. Why do you have to have a gun like that anyways?” her daughter, Denisha, added.

Ross was shot with a single bullet from a .40-calibre Smith & Wesson, an illegal semi-automatic handgun, said Toronto Police Det. Rich Petrie at a news conference Thursday afternoon. The gun has been seized and forensics is analyzing the weapon.

There were “other young people” and a parent in the house at the time of the shooting, one of whom called 911 and all of whom are co-operating with police, Petrie said.

No charges have been laid and there are no outstanding suspects. The incident is being treated as a suspicious death.

“People knew about this gun. It didn’t just show up. It came from somewhere. Somebody knew about it,” Petrie said. “In almost every single incident, somebody was aware of that gun and they chose to turn a blind eye. And this is where we are.”

In the early afternoon, family and friends flocked to Ross’ row house on Jamestown Cres. in Rexdale to comfort her distraught mother, Alicia Jesquith. Wailing emerged from the backyard as members of the community stopped by to pay their respects.

Confusion reigned over exactly what happened. No one could say whether the kids got into an argument, were playing with the gun, or simply dropped it.

Cousin Teneisha Wilson, who has been staying with Ross and her mother for the last month, said she was with Ross’ mother that morning when they learned about the shooting from a television news flash.

Wilson said Jesquith immediately started to panic. “Her little girl was supposed to come home and she didn’t. We went out and wanted to know what happened.”

Outside, they saw police tape was already up around one of the interior parking lots of the housing complex. Officers then confirmed to Jesquith that her daughter had been the victim, Wilson said, and she collapsed.

“She was on the floor. We had to pick her up.”

Neighbours and family described Ross as a studious girl who had just graduated from Greenholm Junior Middle School with As and was excited to head to high school in Mississauga in the fall. She was an active babysitter in the tight-knit neighbourhood, where she moved with her mother two years ago.

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For her birthday last month, one neighbour helped her with her nails, while another did her hair. Many were eager to show off photos they had taken of her that day on her phone.

“She was a positive, bright, young lady who touched everyone,” said Ross’ godmother, Angela Knight, who was adamant that she never had anything to do with guns.

“That is not like Lecent,” said Wilson. “She’s a pretty good kid. She doesn’t do all those things you see teenagers doing. She doesn’t smoke. She doesn’t drink. She’s good at school. She doesn’t miss a day.”

But ever since moving in with her mother two years ago, Ross had adopted a typical teenage attitude, Wilson said. “This place changed her.”

Jamestown has suffered from a series gun deaths in the past few years.

In March, a 46-year-old deaf man, Donald Beckles, was shot outside his home. His wife, who is also hearing-impaired, told the Star that both she and her daughter were very close with Ross.

“I loved her so much,” Edyta Beckles wrote in a reporter’s pad. “Lecent loved (my daughter) Amy more. They were best friends.”

Just as the Beckles’ were starting to heal, this murder has plunged them back into grief again. “I can’t eat any more,” Beckles wrote.

Janet Campbell, whose daughter is Ross’ half-sister, lamented the endemic violence.

“We’ve had it up past here, up to the tree there,” she said, gesturing. “The stigma, how much can we bear? It’s just sad, sad.”