EAST ORANGE, N.J. — Officials say a 4-year-old boy who was accidentally shot by this 6-year-old brother playing with a gun in their East Orange home has died.

A spokeswoman for University Hospital in Newark said the boy was pronounced dead at 4:25 p.m., Saturday.

The spokeswoman said the boy did not die during surgery.

The shooting occurred around 11:15 a.m. Saturday at a halfway house on Norman Street.

Community activists said the mother, 22-year-old Itiyanah Spruill did not have custody of the children. The children lived with their grandmother in Union County.

The mother was enrolled in a mental health program and in the process of getting her GED.

Sources say she had been living on the block for 10 days. She was slated to move into her own apartment in 10 days.

A spokesperson for the Essex County Prosecutor's Office said the gun belonged to the boy's mother. It was not immediately known how the child got the gun.

Spruill has been arrested and charged with endangering the welfare of a child and a weapons violation.

She is being held at the Essex County Correctional Facility until arraignment. Bail has been set at $130,000.