The community of Mount Auburn, Ohio is mourning after gunmen shot and killed a 9-year-old girl in Cincinnati and severely wounded her father.

Alexandrea Thompson was a loving fourth-grader who attended charter school. She was killed and her father injured during a ambush break-in last week, police said.

The family has opened her funeral service to the public. The little girl will be laid to rest in Spring's Grove Cemetery, Norman Chapel.

"We're all out here for that purpose, we all have children and grandchildren we want to see them grow up. and that's the idea that we have a voice that speaks out against this kind of violence," the Rev. Ennis Tait of Church of the Living God told WLKY.

Alex Thompson and his daughter were in the house during a home invasion Wednesday, January 18, 2017, police said. Thompson struggled with attacker, trying to grab his gun when several shots went off.

The 39-year-old father looked up and was struck with horror by what he saw.

"He said he looked up and there was a gun to his daughter's head," the girl's aunt told KMOV. "The guy had her by the neck. He said he looked up and the guy pointed the gun at him. So he said he reacted so fast, because when he saw the gun to his daughters head he froze. But when the guy pointed the gun at him...that's when he grabbed it."

A bullet pierced the chest of little Alexandrea, perhaps passing through her father's body, police said.

"She was behind her dad. She was probably scared," Andrea Thompson, the girl's aunt, told local media. "She ran behind him instead of running away."

"She took her last breath in her sister's arms," the aunt was quoted as saying.

"She found Sissy just breathing really hard, and she said she just cradled her and was rubbing her face telling her its going to be OK. She said Sissy took her last breath in her arms," the aunt told KMOV.

Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers: 513-352-3040.