A young girl tragically succumbed to her injuries days after her mother shot her and her three sisters in the head in a horrific murder-suicide. Olivia Blackmer, 7, fought for her life for five days at a Salt Lake City, Utah hospital after her mother, Tranyelle Harshman, 32, opened fire inside their Byron, Wyoming home on February 10.
The same afternoon, around 1:30 p.m., Harshman called the Big Horn County Sheriff’s Office to report the shooting but did not confess to pulling the trigger. Instead, she simply told the dispatcher that a shooting had taken place at her home and that she believed all four of her children were dead.
Tragic End
Harshman also told the dispatcher that two of her daughters were upstairs in their cribs, while the other two were in a downstairs bedroom. When deputies arrived at the scene, they found two of the girls—a 2-year-old and a 9-year-old, later identified through a fundraiser as Brailey Blackmer—had died from gunshot wounds to the head.
The other two children, another 2-year-old and 7-year-old Olivia, had also suffered gunshot wounds to the head but were still alive.
X
Harshman was found in her bedroom with a gunshot wound to the head but was still breathing when officers entered.
She later died from her injuries at a local hospital, and the surviving 2-year-old also died shortly after at the scene.
Olivia was airlifted to Primary Children’s Hospital in Salt Lake City, Utah, where she had brain surgery and remained heavily sedated for several days to manage swelling in her brain.
However, her father, Quinn Blackmer, shared on Thursday that Olivia’s condition was critical and urged anyone who could to pray to God for her to keep fighting. “This is not an ask, this is a demand,’ he posted on Facebook, according to Cowboy State Daily.
“We are running out of medical choices for her and we truly need a miracle,” he said.
“Her brain is continuing to swell and then react positively to the medication, but this is not long term.”
Even Doctors Failed
Doctors confirmed that surgery to remove part of her skull was no longer an option due to the excessive pressure on her brain, which Blackmer explained would have been “catastrophic.”
In response, residents of Wyoming rallied together, organizing candlelight vigils across the state on Friday to pray for Olivia’s healing, according to Cowboy State Daily.
The tragedy has left the family devastated but Harshman’s husband, Cliff, who had raised Brailey and Olivia since they were two and four and was the biological father of the younger daughters, Brooke, almost three, and Jordan, two, defended his wife, urging the public not to make hasty judgments.
He and Harshman’s friends have said that she struggled with mental health issues, including post-partum depression.
“People don’t understand how mental illness isn’t just a willpower thing. It’s chemical imbalances in your brain. It’s damaged pathways in your brain,” Cliff told KTVQ.
“She was an incredible mom, and she loved those kids,| he said of his wife.
Still, he admitted he is “so angry with her for the decision that was made.”
An online fundraiser has now been set up to help widowed husband, raising more than $127,000 for him as of Sunday.
