A 7-year-old boy allegedly accidentally shot his 2-year-old brother with a gun he found in the glove compartment of his mother’s pickup truck in the parking lot of a California big box store. Monday.
“The mother had just arrived on scene, she was unloading some items that she was going to take inside the store, and while she was outside the truck, the gunshot location,” San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department spokesperson Gloria Huerta told KABC on Wednesday with a somber face.
Shortly before 4 p.m. Monday, emergency services were called to the parking lot of a Floor & Decor store, specializing in floor coverings, where a 2-year-old boy had just been shot.
The boy was then inside his mother’s pickup truck with his 7-year-old brother, when the older brother allegedly found a firearm in one of the front compartments, according to police.
“As a result of this discovery, the fatal result occurred,” the spokesperson continued to the American media.
Despite emergency treatment, the boy was pronounced dead at a nearby hospital.
Neither the type of weapon nor its registration information has been released by police, while an investigation has been opened to shed light on this incident. It is not yet clear whether negligence charges will be filed against the owner of the weapon.
“I would advise parents to take these things seriously. “Gun safety is a huge responsibility, but it’s also a moral obligation we have to our children,” Gloria Huerta told KABC.
Last year, the nonprofit Everytown for Gun Safety documented at least 411 accidents in which a child unintentionally pulled the trigger of a gun they had access to.
This was the highest number of accidents since the agency began compiling data in 2015, according to ABC News.
This year, at least 99 deaths have occurred so far in such conditions, while Everytown for Gun Safety has noted 270 unintentional shootings by children so far, according to the American media.
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