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DonViejo

(60,536 posts)
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 05:36 PM Apr 2013

4-year-old boy accidentally kills Tenn. deputy's wife

4:47p.m. EDT April 8, 2013

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Authorities say a 4-year-old boy got ahold of a loaded gun at a family cookout and shot and killed the wife of a Tennessee sheriff's deputy.

Investigators say Wilson County Deputy Daniel Fanning on Saturday was showing his weapons to a relative in a bedroom of his Lebanon home when the toddler came in and picked up a gun off the bed. Sheriff Robert Bryan says the weapon discharged, hitting 48-year-old Josephine Fanning.

She was pronounced dead at the scene. The child is not related to her or her husband.

Bryan says the shooting was a terrible accident and that within seconds of Fanning placing the gun on the bed, the toddler picked it up.

The gun was not Fanning's service weapon and the sheriff says the deputy's weapons are normally stored in a safe.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/04/08/boy-accidental-shooting/2064627/

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JI7

(89,172 posts)
1. within seconds the kid picked it up ? that means the kid was there playing around already
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 05:39 PM
Apr 2013

and you decide to just put a gun down there like that when there is a little kid around ?

 

alcibiades_mystery

(36,437 posts)
5. Oh, when I clicked on this thread I thought he would have done it with a pair of scissors or a knife
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 06:06 PM
Apr 2013

Who could have guessed that a 4 year old would accidentally kill somebody with a GUN!?!

NightWatcher

(39,343 posts)
8. What type of gun and what condition was it?
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 06:12 PM
Apr 2013

Sounds like it was cocked if a 4 year old could pull the trigger.

Whomever had the gun should be charged w/negligence or involuntary manslaughter.

mokawanis

(4,434 posts)
11. And when the gun nuts tell you it's all about proper training
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 06:34 PM
Apr 2013

and safe handling of weapons blah blah blah just refer them to this article and others like it. Even the best-trained people fuck up and get people killed.

Beaverhausen

(24,466 posts)
13. He was showing a loaded weapon to a friend
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 06:37 PM
Apr 2013

This is a police officer we are talking about. And now his wife is dead. Fucked up.

 

slackmaster

(60,567 posts)
14. I always make sure a weapon is unloaded before I show it to someone
Mon Apr 8, 2013, 06:40 PM
Apr 2013

It's instinctive, the product of careful training by my dad.

Every time you pick up a firearm (other than when you intend to shoot it) you check to make sure it's unloaded. Before handing it to another person, you check it again. When the person hands it back to you, you check it again. As you are putting it away in your safe, you check to make sure it's unloaded.

You check it even if you are sure you were the last person to handle it. Every time.

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