3-year-old accidentally shoots his mom to death in family's car in a suburban Chicago supermarket parking lot
A 3-year-old boy accidentally shot his mother to death as the family was sitting in their car in a suburban Chicago supermarket parking lot, police said. The woman was shot Saturday in Dolton and pronounced dead at a hospital, police said.
The family was sitting in their car outside a Food 4 Less store when the boy somehow found the gun and fired it, striking his mother, police said. Authorities said the boy's father was in custody after indicating that he owned the gun.
The Chicago Sun-Times identified the victim as 22-year-old Dejah Bennet.
No charges have been filed as police continue investigating. The Associated Press left a message Monday seeing updated information from police.
"This could have been prevented," Dolton trustee Andrew Holmes said Sunday as he visited the supermarket to hand out gun locks and speak to shoppers about the importance of gun safety. "All it takes is a second: unlock it, thread it through the barrel, bring it back around, put it in and lock it back," Holmes told WLS-TV. "If you leave it, secure it."
According to data analyzed by advocacy group Everytown for Gun Safety, so far this year there have been at least 43 unintentional shootings by children in the U.S., resulting in 16 deaths and 29 injuries.
Last year, there were at least 379 unintentional shootings by children nationwide, resulting in 154 deaths and 244 injuries, the group said.