TRAGIC SHOOTING ACCIDENT

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 291, 8 September 1928, Page 10

TRAGIC SHOOTING ACCIDENT

CHILDREN AND FIREARMS COMMENT BY MAGISTRATE Dominion Special Service. Auckland, September 7. A verdict of accidental death was returned at an inquest into the death of the little boy, Janies Bruce Garner, who was accidentally shot, at his parent’s residence in Ponsonby yesterday. Mrs. Gertrude Evelyn Garner, mother of deceased, said that about three o’clock yesterday afternoon she was working in the kitchen of her home, and that her three children. Bruce, Jack, and George, wbre playing in the spare bedroom with their uncle. Brian Jack McQprmaek, the latter being ten years of age. “I heard a loud noise.” said Mrs. Garner, “and I thought perhaps that it was the front door banging. I -also heard loud screaming. . I ran along the passage and went into the room, where I found Bruce lying on the floor. I then saw that he had been shof. He was lying alongside the bed in a pool of blood.”

Brian Jack McCormack said that Bruce got hold of a pea-rifle, picked It up, and said: “I am going to make it go ‘click.’” Witness then picked tip a shotgun, which was also in the room, and said: “My word this is hard to pull back.” “I then let the hammer go.” continued witness, “and the gun went off. I did not load it.” James Garner, father of deceased, said the boy died immediately after he arrived home. It was his usual practice to take the gun to pieces when putting it away. He had used it a fdrtnight last Sunday when he went rabbit shooting at Huniia Valley with another man. On returning, the other man took the gun out of the car and put it away in the house. After the tragedy he found three or four cartridges on the mantelpiece in the spare-room. He was not aware that the gun had been left loaded. “People should be particularly careful to keep firearms out of the reach of children. I have had many inquests through guns being left carelessly about,” said Mr. Hunt, at the conclusion of the evidence.