Daycare shooting

I woke up this morning, turned on the news, and what do I hear? There was a shooting inside a Germantown, Md. daycare today. And no, the shooter was not some crazed parent or a psycho gunman that was able to gain access. The triggerman was an 8-year-old boy.

Think about that. An 8-year-old?? I don't know about you, but when I was 8, I was riding my bike up and down the street, getting dirty, and coming home with holes in the knees of my pants. The thought of even SEEING a gun never crossed my mind.

The victim of this very unfortunate incident was a 7-year-old girl. Apparently the boy brought the gun from home in his backpack. At some point, just before 7 a.m., he was handling it inside the backpack at the daycare center when the .38 caliber revolver discharged and the girl was hit in the arm. This little girl is pretty damn lucky because if she was hit a few inches over in her chest, we might be talking about a "fatal shooting."

More details were released today as the investigation unfolded and it is now known that the boy took the gun and bullets from an unlocked container in a closet that stored his father's items. The gun belonged to his father. As a result, the father has been arrested and charged with leaving a firearm in a location accessible by an unsupervised minor, contributing to the delinquency of a minor, and possession of a firearm by a prohibited person (a felon).

This story really gets to me because I went through firearms training in the academy and I am well aware of the dangers of firearms. If these are not stored properly and not handled with proper care by a qualified person, tragedies like this can occur. I put some blame on the 8-year-old boy because at that age, he should know what a gun is and how dangerous it can be, but his father is the problem behind this. That gun MUST be either in a locked container (a safe), or it should be dismantled and the parts should be separated. This is common sense and I don't why this guy didn't bother to take the necessary precautions.

If this shooting was fatal, this father should have been charged with manslaughter. He did not pull the trigger, but he provided easy access to the weapon due to his negligence and ill regard for safety.

I hope this story proves to everyone that guns are very dangerous and if you own one, which I fully support if it is legal, you better be safe with it.

-Jason