Relatives say Danielle Little’s death left seven children, including a premature baby, at the heart of the family’s loss.
PHOENIX, Ariz. — When Danielle Jean Kassandra Little was shot outside her north Phoenix apartment, the violence did not stop with her death. It also shattered a household that relatives say included seven children, some of whom were just steps away.
Little, 35, died after the March 23 shooting near 11th Avenue and Mountain View Road, where police said she was arguing with her neighbor, 21-year-old Daniel Rombach Jr. Officers found her wounded at about 8:05 a.m. and detained Rombach at the scene. Prosecutors later filed a second-degree murder charge. The case has drawn unusual attention not only because police say it grew out of an alleged $100 debt, but because family members say children witnessed parts of the confrontation and now must live with the memory of it.
In interviews after the shooting, Little’s family did not begin with the debt or the gun. They began with who was left behind. Her relatives said she was raising seven children, and local television reports said one of her babies had been born at 27 weeks and remained in a neonatal intensive care unit. Her son described seeing his mother collapse. Her husband and sister spoke about the trauma of replaying the scene and the strain of explaining the killing to children who were in or near the apartment when it happened. Those accounts gave the case a second center of gravity: not only the criminal allegation against a neighbor, but the sudden collapse of a family’s daily life.
Only after that family loss came the details of the dispute that police and court records say led to the shooting. According to a probable cause affidavit, Little had agreed to pay Rombach $100 after accidentally backing into his car about a month earlier. Relatives said she intended to pay but was short on money after rent. On March 23, the affidavit says, the issue surfaced again after one of Little’s sons broke a lawn ornament near a nearby unit. Rombach allegedly came outside and demanded the money. Little’s husband told investigators the argument intensified, Rombach pulled a handgun from his waistband, and Little told him he was not going to shoot her in front of her children. Prosecutors allege he then fired one round at close range.
The family’s public comments have also filled in parts of Little’s life that do not appear in police records. Her sister, Hailey Byer, said Little had gone through addiction struggles in the past but had gotten sober and cared deeply about her children. Her husband, Kyle Daniels, and her son spoke in simple, direct terms about missing her and trying to process what happened. Byer also expressed disbelief that a dispute over such a small amount of money could end with a killing. Those statements do not decide the criminal case, but they show how relatives want Little remembered: not just as a victim named in court records, but as a mother whose life was defined by the children now mourning her.
Police, meanwhile, have focused on the legal path ahead. The department said the initial investigation showed Little and Rombach were neighbors engaged in a verbal argument before the shooting. Court records cited by local media say Rombach later told officers he did not mean to shoot Little and forgot the weapon did not have a safety device. Investigators also wrote that he expressed remorse. He was booked into jail, and local reports said he was being held on a $1 million bond with a court date set for March 30. The coming proceedings are expected to examine witness accounts, physical evidence and the statements collected by detectives in the first hours after the shooting.
In the days after Little’s death, the apartment complex became a place where grief and criminal procedure met. One side of the story moved into bond amounts, charging language and court calendars. The other stayed with children, hospital visits and relatives trying to put words around a morning they said began like any other. That split has defined the public understanding of the case from the start.
As of April 16, the murder charge remained pending, while Little’s family continued mourning the mother they said held the household together.
Author note: Last updated April 16, 2026.