Should Kids Have Guns? 5-year-old Kills Sister With His Rifle

Giving a 5-year-old child a .22-caliber rifle as a gift is ludicrous. Leaving that child alone with his 2-year-old sister is criminal. As a result of two idiotic parents taking the 2nd amendment way too far, their daughter is dead.

2-year-old Caroline Starks was shot dead by her 5-year-old brother. Yes, it was an accident. Yes, everyone is devastated, including the townfolk, but that's irrelevant.

Apparently, the boy had been given the gun last year for his fourth birthday, and was playing with it in the house when mom stupidly walked out of the house for a moment, leaving her son alone with his gun, and boom. One child gone.

The weapon was a Crickett rifle made for children, and called "My First Rifle", and had been sitting in the corner of their house (not locked up as it should have been) with a shell in the barrel, that the mum claims she had no idea was still there.  So maybe the son wasn't playing with the gun when she went out to the porch, but the fact that the gun was lying around the house is unconscionable.

Local coroner Gary White said of the incident, it was "just one of those crazy accidents".  No, it's crazy to give a 5-year-old a real gun.

The lucky parents will not be charged with negligence, although they should be.

Sources: L.A. Times, The Sun