Omarion Greenhouse woke up about midnight. He walked into the living room where a man was asleep on the couch, Montgomery police said.

The 7-year-old startled the man who grabbed his gun inside the trailer park home off Troy Highway. The man shot Omarion, killing him.

Police arrested Willie Sankey, 32, on a capital murder charge after responding to the home on Coronet Drive about 12:45 a.m. He is being held without bond in the Montgomery County Detention Facility.

According to court records, Sankey is charged under a subsection of the capital murder code that makes it a capital offense to kill a child younger than 14.

Omarion was still alive when police and fire medics arrived, according to a Montgomery Police Department news release. Omarion was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead. He's the 31st homicide case under investigation by the Montgomery Police Department.

Omarion was a first-grader at Brewbaker Primary School, which has had two students die this year.

Brewbaker Principal Catherine Rogers said he attended her school since kindergarten.

"He was a sweet 7-year-old baby, and his smile just lit up a room," Rogers said. She talked about his curly hair and said he was a great friend to his classmates.

"The Montgomery Public Schools family is mourning the senseless loss of this young life," Superintendent Ann Roy Moore said in the news release. "We are all too often faced with burying our innocent children. The Board, staff and I offer our prayers for Omarion's family. After last week's scare at another elementary school, this just reinforces the need for adults to renew our efforts to keep our children safe. It is a tragic loss."

In the first week of school, a Blount Elementary student's father is accused of shooting at another father in the morning drop-off lane of the school.

More:Montgomery father, found to be under the influence, charged with murder after daughter's death in fatal wreck

Moore sent counselors to Brewbaker to talk with Omarion's classmates and school staff.

Omarion is the second Brewbaker student to die this year. Maylia Mejia, 7, was killed when the car her father was driving wrecked at the intersection of Eastern Boulevard and Buckboard Road in February. Bernardino Mejia was charged with murder after he was accused of being under the influence of alcohol at the time of the wreck.

"We went through this last year with another baby so our staff is like a family and we will help out his family in any way we can," Rogers said, adding that she had been in contact with Omarion's family Friday morning.

As a school, she said, "we have to pull together and remember the good things about Omarion."

Contact Montgomery Advertiser reporter Kirsten Fiscus at 334-318-1798 or KFiscus@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter @KDFiscus. Krista Johnson contributed reporting.