Captain Mark Bollinger, a spokesman for the Rock Hill Police Department, told reporters the two-year-old Rock Hill, South Carolina boy accidentally shot his grandmother after he found a .357 gun in a pouch behind the front passenger’s seat of a car he was riding in with his grandmother and great-aunt.
The little boy was riding in the backseat with just a seat belt to restrain him. The gun was in a pouch on the back of the front passenger’s seat. He was able to reach into the pouch, pull out the gun, which he accidentally fired, hitting his grandmother in the back. She was riding in the front passenger seat and the great-aunt, her sister, was driving.
The shooting occurred on Sunday, just after 1 p.m. while the car was traveling through a red light at the intersection of Ogden Road and Heckle Boulevard in southern Rock Hill, the police report reads. In the report, the 40-year-old victim told police she heard the gunshot and realized she had been shot.
The boy’s aunt, who was driving told police that when she turned around to look in the back seat, the child “was holding the gun in both hands and began to cry.” Due to a considerable amount of confusion at the scene, police originally said the boy was four, but learned he was only two.
Leading up to the incident, the boy was picked up by his relatives at another family member’s residence. The gun had been left in the pouch behind the front passenger’s seat. “We’re still trying to figure out how the child pulled the trigger,” Bollinger said.
Bollinger added that after the shooting, the aunt drove to another relative’s house close-by on Stanley Drive. The grandmother was taken to Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte with non-threatening injuries. She is expected to recover.
Investigators are consulting the 16th Circuit Solicitor’s Office to determine what, if any charges will be filed. The owner of the gun could face prosecution for improperly storing a gun or leaving a weapon within reach of a child, Bollinger said, adding the gun did not have a lock on it.
