Young Boy Saves His Mother's Life By Shooting Drunken Attacker With a BB Gun

It's going to be a happy Thanksgiving for one Bellingham, Washington, family after a young boy took decisive action to save his mother from a vicious attacker.

Police say 11-year-old Kobe Sturgeon shot the man with a BB rifle after he drunkenly attacked his mother in the family's home. Authorities are calling the young boy a hero for taking action during such a dramatic and chaotic incident.

The man at the center of the story, Paul R. Newman, 45, rents a room in the house. After he came home inebriated on Tuesday morning, authorities say he became enraged over the fact that his room was messy. So, according to authorities, Newman kicked down a bedroom door and began to choke Kobe's mother.

Kobe quickly intervened and hit Newman with a wooden board from a book shelf. When this didn't work, he then shot the man in the face three or four times with a BB rifle. This freed the mother and son to escape to a neighbor's house, where they were able to call police for help.

“He kept on hurting my mom, so I went and grabbed my BB gun and I said, ‘Get off my mom. Get off my mom,’” the young boy said in an interview with KOMO-TV. “And then I shot him with my BB gun.”

Newman was taken to the hospital and arrested for investigation of assault and making death threats. He was treated for non-life threatening injuries.