A Toddler, a Loose Gun in a Car, and a Mother Dies
By RICHARD PÉREZ-PEÑA

No one can know for sure what was in the mind of the person who fired the shot that killed a woman as she drove through Milwaukee on Tuesday. The shooter was 2 years old.

The woman who died on State Highway 175 was Patrice Price, 26, the Milwaukee County sheriff’s office said Wednesday, and the gun was in the hands of her own toddler.

The weapon, which investigators found on the floor of the back seat, was a .40-caliber pistol used by Ms. Price’s boyfriend, a security guard. His gun belt and tactical vest were also in the car, the sheriff’s office said. The local news media reported that the blue Dodge sedan Ms. Price was driving belonged to the boyfriend.

The sheriff’s office, which would not name the boyfriend, said in a statement that the 2-year-old, who was not in a car seat, “retrieved a firearm that slid out from under the driver’s seat and shot through the seat, striking the driver.”

Ms. Price managed to stop the car, but by the time rescue personnel reached her, she was not breathing. She was pronounced dead at the scene.

The sheriff’s office did not say whether anyone would face criminal charges.

In tales of gun violence, accidents involving curious children and weapons seem especially tragic, but they are not especially unusual. Most often, they involve guns left unsecured by the child’s parents.

In the seven days that ended Tuesday, in addition to the death of Ms. Price, a 3-year-old in Georgia, a 3-year-old in Louisiana, a 2-year-old in Missouri and a 2-year-old in Indiana fatally shot themselves; a 4-year-old in Texas shot and wounded a family member; a 16-year-old in California killed a 14-year-old friend in a shooting that officials called accidental; a 15-year-old in Texas accidentally shot and wounded a 16-year-old friend; and a 13-year-old in Indiana accidentally shot and wounded herself.

In an episode with striking parallels to the Milwaukee shooting, last month a mother driving in Florida was shot and wounded by her 4-year-old son, who was in the back seat; law enforcement officials said that in that case, too, the gun had been stashed under the driver’s seat, and then slid backward. The woman, Jamie Gilt, had operated a pro-gun Facebook page on which she said her children knew how to shoot, and “even my 4-year-old gets jacked up to target shoot the .22.”

Everytown for Gun Safety, the gun control group, says that since the start of 2015, at least 342 people in the United States have been accidentally shot by people under age 18.

When Ms. Price, a mother of three, was fatally shot in Milwaukee, her mother and her 1-year-old child were also in the car.

“Now I don’t have her no more,” her father, Andre Price, told WISN, a local television station. “I got a knot in my chest.”

美2歲兒車上開槍 意外擊斃媽媽

美國威斯康辛州警方今天表示，1名幼兒在汽車後座撿起駕駛座下方滑出來的手槍，意外開槍擊斃前座的媽媽。

根據法新社，警方表示，意外昨天發生在威州的密爾瓦基（Milwaukee），26歲的母親普萊斯（Patrice Price）當場死亡。

地方媒體報導，她的2歲兒子撿起點40口徑手槍後開槍，子彈穿過駕駛座。

根據WISN電視台網站，普萊斯的父親表示，普萊斯有3個孩子。他告訴WISN：「我胸口鬱悶。他們甚至不讓我見女兒，我想再抱她最後一次。」

手槍似乎屬於普萊斯的保全男友，「密爾瓦基哨兵日報」（Milwaukee Journal Sentinel）報導，她當時開著男友的車是因為她的車失竊。

警方表示，在副駕駛座地板發現普萊斯男友的保全槍帶。釀成意外的手槍在駕駛座後方的地板發現，全案仍在調查中。

當時在車上的人還有普萊斯的1歲幼兒和母親。兩個小孩當時都沒有放在兒童座椅上。

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/28/us/a-toddler-a-loose-gun-in-a-car-and-a-mother-dies.html

紐約時報中文版翻譯：
http://cn.nytstyle.com/education-career/20160428/t28shooting/zh-hant/

2016-04-28 聯合新聞網 中央社