Mitchel Picken, who excelled at several sports, was injured at lunchtime last Thursday and died in hospital two days later.

His two friends, both aged 12, were arrested and held in custody for six hours. They were released on bail pending further inquiries. They were said to be utterly distraught.

The dead boy’s parents said last night that they could not begin to describe their grief.

It is thought that the three boys were “messing around” in a bedroom at one of their homes in Stoke-on-Trent, when the shot was fired. No adults were at home at the time.

Staffordshire Police have described their inquiry as very sensitive. They were reluctant to discuss the details of how Mitchel came to be shot.

It appears that the children may have been firing out of the bedroom window at a target in the back garden. Somehow, as one of his friends was brandishing the air rifle, a pellet was fired into the boy’s right eye.

An ambulance was called and Mitchel was rushed to hospital. He underwent surgery and spent two days in a critical condition in intensive care before dying on Saturday.

A post-mortem examination found that he died from a penetration wound to the head.

Andrew and Joanne Picken, his parents, issued a statement yesterday in which they spoke of his love of sport and his close relationship with his seven-year-old brother and his passion for his favourite football team.

“Mitchel was a beautiful, intelligent young boy, and we cannot describe our grief at losing him in such a tragic way,” they said.

“We have lost a kind and caring son. He and his brother Lewis thought the world of each other. There is now a massive gap in all of our lives.”

Mr and Mrs Picken, aged 37 and 35 respectively, said that Mitchel had “lived for his football team”, Port Vale. He was a season-ticket holder and had once been the team mascot.

Mitchel was a talented footballer and athlete. He was awarded the player of the year title by his junior football team and had been chosen to run at representative level in both 800 metres and cross-country events. He also played cricket, tennis, snooker and pool.

His parents said: “He would have a go at anything and would always do it well. We loved Mitchel dearly. He was a fun-loving boy with the world at his feet and everything to live for.”

Detective Inspector Neil Hulme, who is leading the inquiry, said that the incident was “a terrible reminder of the dangers of children having access to air weapons”.

Police have not revealed who owned the air rifle and it is not known whether the boys had been given permission to use it. The weapon is undergoing scientific tests at a specialist firearms laboratory.

Mr Hulme said: “This is obviously a very sensitive inquiry. We are working with the other two boys to establish exactly what happened before deciding on the most appropriate way forward.”

Roy Barber, a 62-year-old company director, who lives near where the shooting happened, said that he heard the rifle being fired.

“It was unusual because this is normally a quiet area,” he said. “The family that live there are very pleasant and it’s tragic that something like this has happened around here.

“I’ve heard that the boys were messing around with a target in the back garden and shooting from the window, but I’m not sure how the boy got hit.”

Another neighbour, Steph Jones, a 17-year-old student, said that he used to play with one of the boys when he was younger.

“He is a lovely lad,” he said. “It must have been a tragic accident. I heard that they could have been mucking around with the gun and it just went off. It’s awful.”

Mitchel is the third child to be killed in 18 months by air weapons. In May last year, Alex Cole, who was 12, died when he was shot in the eye by an air rifle pellet while playing at his best friend’s house in Conisborough, near Doncaster.

Three months earlier a two-year-old boy, Andrew Morton, died after being shot in the head near his Glasgow home. The air rifle pellet had been fired from a window by a 27-year-old drug addict, Mark Bonini. He was convicted of the child’s murder and jailed for life.

TOUGHER RULES ON AIR WEAPONS

• A law introduced three years ago has tightened restrictions on the use of air weapons, but anti-gun campaigners say that the rules are still too lax
  
  
• The Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003 increased from 14 to 17 the age below which it is an offence to be in possession of an air rifle or air gun
  
  
• Exemptions include under-17s who are members of an approved club, or who are under the supervision of someone aged 21 or above, or who, from the age of 14, are on private premises with the consent of the owner
  
  
• The Act also made it an offence to manufacture, sell, purchase or acquire any air weapon that uses a self-contained gas cartridge system. These are regarded as easily convertible into full-blown firearms
  
  
• Tightening of the regulations will come when the Violent Crime Reduction Bill, which has completed its committee stage in the House of Commons, gains Royal Assent
  
  
• The Bill raises the age limit for owning an air weapon to 18 and introduces a new offence of firing an air weapon beyond the boundary of a premises
  
  
• It will create a new registration scheme that will ban the sale of air weapons except face-to-face and through a registered dealer

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