Heartbroken father speaks of horror after 12-year-old daughter called out to him as she lay dying

A heartbroken father has told of his horror as his 12-year-old daughter called out to him as she lay dying after being hit by a stray bullet in a gangland shootout. Distraught dad, Sandro Alves Silva, was pinned down by the gunfire and unable to reach his little girl.

Sandro said his daughter, Kamila Vitoria Aparecida de Souza Silva, was fatally shot while playing dodgeball near their home in Rio de Janeiro, in Brazil, on Thursday (December 5). Her last words were her shouting for help: "Dad, dad!"

Kamila was hit by a stray bullet while playing with her friends on a court when violence broke out between warring factions in the Favela do Guarda, in Del Castilho, in the notoriously violent North Zone of Rio. Her horrified father saw it all happen but could not get to her because of the intense gunfire.

Sandro said: "I yelled out to her: ‘My daughter, stay down there’. She sat on the court, then lay down and called me: ‘Dad, dad’. But I couldn’t go to her. There was a lot of shooting, a lot of shooting."

He added: "When the shooting stopped, I ran to her, and with the help of neighbours, we put her in the car and tried to help her. On the way to the hospital, she just moaned. We said: ‘Don’t fall asleep, don’t fall asleep,’ but it was as if she was no longer here."

The shot struck the girl's leg and hit the femoral artery, causing her to bleed out in minutes. Grief-stricken Sandro said: "She was a straight-A girl. When she got a bad grade, she would say, ‘Dad, I’m going to make it up’, and she would spend the day studying for her tests. She wanted to be a veterinarian and loved taking care of animals."

Kamila had recently joined a volleyball team and was excited about the possibility of competing in a championship. Through tears, Sandro told local media: "She asked me for knee pads for Christmas. That’s all, to play volleyball. But I didn’t have time to buy them."

Kamila was the older sister and had a special relationship with her younger sister, who was just five months old. Sandro said: "She was everything to us. A girl full of dreams, a golden girl."

Sandro, who came to Rio de Janeiro in 2009, believed he could build a better future for his family in the community. He said: "My wife always said, ‘Let’s get out of here’. But I believed this would be our future. Now I see that she was right."

The heartbroken dad added: "Nothing will bring my daughter back, but we hope that justice will be served. Even so, I leave everything in God’s hands."

The shooters reportedly fled after the incident and police are currently searching for them.