The mother called 911 to say her 5-year-old boy shot his baby brother with a paintball gun.
But it wasn't a paintball gun. It was a .22-caliber Magnum revolver. And the 9-month-old boy didn't survive.
Authorities are trying to figure out what led to Monday's shooting in Elmo, in the northwest corner of Missouri.
"At this point foul play is not suspected, and it appears at this time that the shooting was accidental," the Nodaway County Sheriff's Office said.
Sheriff Darren White told CNN affiliate KCTV that the baby was in a playpen when his brother found the gun lying around a bed.
When emergency crews arrived, they found the infant had been shot in the head. The child was flown to Children's Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, Missouri, where he was pronounced dead, the station reported.
Apparently the gun did not belong to the mother but instead to another unidentified relative.
The authorities are still deciding whether charges should be filed, which to my mind is just another reason to stay the fuck out of Missouri. Because as far as I'm concerned you leave a loaded firearm out on a bed, and a child uses it to kill a baby, your ass is going to jail.
Period!
I feel that whomever OWNS the gun, as well as whomever left it lying around (if, indeed, that is a different person) should be sent to jail and be forced to remain there until the time that baby comes back to life.
ReplyDeleteSo, why isn't it a crime to leave a loaded gun on a bed in a room with a baby in a playpen and a five year-old around? The parents should go to prison for a long time.
ReplyDeleteBeaglemom
Lord have mercy on us all.
ReplyDeletedowl
"The authorities are still deciding whether charges should be filed, which to my mind is just another reason to stay the fuck out of Missouri. "
ReplyDelete------------------------------------
I am so tired of this. Preventable deaths and injuries are treated as if they just happened with no way to have known they could happen.
Of course charges should be filed against any adult who knew a gun was in the home and couldn't be bothered to secure it and/or make sure it was not loaded.
I also don't believe parents whose negligence, recklessness, carelessness, and irresponsibility is a direct cause of their child's easily preventable death or injury "have suffered enough." Charge them.
I agree completely. I wonder, if the family were African American, if no charges would be brought. We seem to have two distinct systems of justice here, especially in Missouri.
DeleteBeaglemom
Oh, but Gryphen, the family has suffered enough.
ReplyDelete/sarcasm, but unfortunately it will probably be the reason given why nobody goes to prison for causing the death of a baby and the lifelong traumatization of the kid who killed him.
Gryphen, thanks for keeping up the good fight, and continuing to post these stories.
ReplyDeleteIt's heartbreaking. I feel for the 5 year old boy as well, and I hope he can be sheltered from any blame, although his parents don't seem to be too bright in the parenting department.
R in NC
Your commenters seem to grasp the horror of this situation, but have a disconnect regarding the horror/grief/shame that will follow the family until the days each of them die.
ReplyDeleteThey are in a prison, without parole, now.
It's the Republican way to put everyone in jail and throw away the key because they don't understand the power of grief and shame. They're only interested in their idea of a pound of flesh.
Better to have the family (and all such families) enlisted to change the gun laws, to advocate for change as their sole occupations.
Unfortunately the parents need real time in prison. the five year-old needs to be raised by someone who will love and protect him. I certainly hope that the parents feel remorse but their carelessness and negligence caused the baby's death and they should have to pay a real-life price for that. Maybe other adults will become a little more attentive to the dangers of keeping loaded guns in homes with children. Too often, the authorities shake their heads and say that the family will always regret what happened. It is NEVER an accident when a loaded gun is left on a bed in a house with young children.
DeleteBeaglemom
In VT, I get puled over for child safety seat checks (because I have a booster for the dog, and, well, maybe it looks like child seat). My prescriptions come in child proof bottles. My last jug of windshield washer fluid was so child proof I had to use a knife and pliers.
ReplyDeleteChild safety gadget for guns, of course, that's not required. The NRA would have a hissy fit.
Anon at 8:15 - I totally agree with you, and the fact that just now I realized it would've been easier to just poke a hole in the container of bleach than to get the top off has nothing to do with it.
DeleteIf you care for your kids, you protect them. I don't doubt the parent(s) in this case are very very sorry they're in jail, but I do have to wonder just how much sorrow they have for the dead baby. Just 'cause people can reproduce doesn't mean their offspring are the light of their world.
Bravo! I'm the same way and have been pulled over for my dog's seat, I have the package and receipt it came in, same with the medicine and possible and known poisons. Guess what? We haven't had one "accident". If I owned a gun, I'd be even more responsible. Who leaves a loaded gun on the floor in a house with kids?
DeleteMore gun fail. Accidental discharge at the office.
ReplyDeletehttp://wreg.com/2015/01/21/mississippi-gaming-officer-shot-in-tunica/
Can I ask a stupid question?
ReplyDeleteHow many, approximately, dead children and dead babies will it take before gun laws are tightened? I can't drive my car without the seat belts engaged or I get a fine, What's the "magic number"? that makes people act responsibly with their toys and gizmos in houses with kids?
And it happened again just a day or two after this tragedy a three year old child left alone in a car took a loaded pistol from the glove box and shot himself in the head. The parents are not being charged under the "they've suffered enough" bullshit rule.
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