A 3-year-old girl fatally shot her 4-year-old sister after finding a loaded gun in their Texas home, police said.
Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez said the girls were alone in a bedroom at their parents’ apartment around 8 p.m. Sunday night when the incident occurred. Gonzalez said about five adults were also in the apartment but the girls were unintentionally left unsupervised because one parent thought the other was watching them.
The 3-year-old found a loaded semiautomatic pistol and fired a single shot, Gonzalez said. Family members rushed into the room where they found the 4-year-old girl unresponsive on the floor.
The girl was pronounced dead at the scene.
“It just seems like another tragic story of, again, a child gaining access to a firearm and hurting someone else and this time there was a fatal shot,” Gonzalez said.
The Harris County District Attorney’s Office will decide whether any of the adults will face charges based on the police investigation.
Gonzalez said it is very likely someone will be charged for failing to properly secure the weapon.
“You’ve got to be sure you’re being a responsible gun owner, securing your weapons in a safe place,” he said. “It’s got to be more than just telling young kids not to touch the weapons. You know, we’ve got to do a little more. We see far too many tragic situations like this unfold.”
According to data compiled by Everytown Research & Policy, 765 people died and more than 1,300 were injured in 2,070 unintentional shootings by children between 2015 and 2020.
Earlier this year, an elementary school student in Newport News, Virgina shot and injured his teacher at school with a gun he brought from home. Prosecutors are yet to decide whether to bring charges against the child’s parents in that case, according to NBC News.
