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Charges unlikely in death of girl, 5
3-year-old found mom's hidden gun
By CHRISTOPHER QUINN
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 11/07/06
The gun tucked under a mattress was meant for protection. It ended up at the center of a family tragedy.
A 3-year-old found the gun Sunday and accidentally shot and killed his 5-year-old sister, Morgan King, in northern Cherokee County.
It is unlikely anyone will be charged. Georgia, unlike some other states, does not require guns to be stored safely, inaccessible to curious kids.
"It's not negligence. It's just a bad accident," said Cpl. Nicole Ebbescotte of the Cherokee County Sheriff's Department. "I'm sure the parents are suffering enough as it is."
District Attorney Garry Moss said he has talked with investigators about the case but knows only preliminary facts.
The rural community of Waleska was rallying around the family Monday.
The Rev. Billy Wallace of Goshen Baptist Church said the Kings live near his church and sometimes attend. Wallace said Waleska is a small place and most folks are familiar with each other.
"This community knows them well and stands behind them," Wallace said.
He said the father, Adam King, works as a mechanic for a construction company that clears lots for subdivisions. King owns a Bobcat and does electrical and plumbing work for people around town, he said.
Adam King was out of town Sunday, and his wife, Sandy, had put a .22-caliber Browning pistol under her mattress to protect herself.
Her 3- and 5-year old children were in the bedroom that afternoon playing video games while she was in a bathroom getting ready to go shopping. She heard one shot, according to an investigation report.
Her 3-year-old son ran from the room saying, "Sorry, Sissy" over and over.
King ran to the bedroom to find Morgan lying on the bed with blood on her head.
She dialed 911. The child was taken by helicopter to Children's Healthcare of Atlanta, where she died.
Congressman David Scott wonders how many children would be alive today if legislation he pushed as a state senator in the 1980s had passed.
"Events like this, perhaps, will hasten the day when we realize we are losing too many children," Scott said by phone Monday.
He hopes the General Assembly will take another run at child access prevention laws, called CAP laws, like he pushed without success. They require gun owners to do things such as keep trigger locks on guns or store them out of easy reach of children.
Some research indicates that CAP laws can reduce the number of children and teenagers who die from shootings.
"There are other loose guns out there, waiting for this to happen," Scott said.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, children are frequent victims in accidental shootings. Between 1999 and 2003, 30 Georgia children and teenagers died from accidental shootings.
Nationally, 362 children between the ages of 1 and 14 were killed in shooting accidents between 1999 and 2003.
A study by Emory University more than five years ago showed children put in a room where a gun is hidden will likely find it and try to pull the trigger.
"It reconfirmed that children will explore their environment. And if they do find a gun, they will play with it and potentially fire it," said Dr. Harold Simon, who helped conduct the study.
Parents who trust teenagers around guns have "misguided confidence" that their children will act safely, according to further research at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Daniel Webster, the co-director of the Center for Gun Policy and Research there, said in an e-mail: "The brains of pre-adolescents and adolescents have not fully developed, making it difficult for them to understand long-term consequences to their actions and [easy] to misperceive risks. Research shows that it's difficult for teens to follow parents' instructions about how to handle firearms."
He said his research indicates CAP laws significantly reduce teen suicides and also lower accidental shooting deaths.
Staff writers S.A. Reid, Yolanda Rodriguez and Alice Wertheim contributed to this article
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Maybe there are rabid dogs rampant in the town
