Every year, nearly 3000 children and teens die from gunfire, and nearly 14,000 are injured.

Thursday, February 7, 2013

3-year old South Carolina boy killed when playing with pink handgun

Tmorej Smith, age 3
3-year old Tmorej Smith and his 7-year old sister were in their parents' bedroom in their Greenville, South Carolina apartment when they found a loaded, unsecured gun and began playing with it.

One of them discharged the gun, and a round hit Tmorej in the head, killing him.

The parents were gone at the time, but their grandparents were in another room of the apartment.

No charges have been filed.

From an article and news video:

Police responded to a call about a shooting at Haywood Plantation Apartments in Greenville, S.C., at 7:30 p.m. Friday night, the Associated Press reported. There, officers found 3-year-old Temorej Smith dead from a single gunshot wound to the head. 
On Monday, police reported that the shooting occurred while Smith and his 7-year-old sister were in a bedroom at home, playing with a pink handgun they might have thought was a toy, according to CBS local affiliate WCSC. 
"If you have guns, if you own guns mostly we would prefer you have them in a lock box," Johnathan Bragg of the Greenville Police Department told the news station. "At least have them out of the reach of children." 
Smith lived in the apartment with his parents, grandparents and sister. The parents were not home at the time of the shooting, the county's deputy coroner Jeff Fowler told Greenville Online
The shooting has been ruled an accident. No charges have been filed yet, but the investigation is ongoing.

The gun was pink, and could have been mistaken as a toy.  This is the risk of making lethal weapons "cute."

(a related article)

Every gun in the hands of a child must first pass through the hands of an adult.

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