A woman who is a public pro-gun advocate was accidentally shot by her 4-year-old son while driving on Tuesday.
Jamie Gilt, who has a Facebook page called “Jamie Gilt for Gun Sense,” was hospitalized after the shooting and is in stable condition, CNN reports. Ironically, the shooting happened just a day after Jamie wrote about her son’s excitement over using a gun. “Even my 4-year-old gets jacked up to target shoot with the .22,” she said during an online debate about using guns for self-defense.
The Florida resident was discovered by a sheriff’s deputy, who noticed her motioning for help from the driver’s side of her truck, which was parked partially on the road.
"She was sitting in the driver seat and he was in the back seat, behind her. He shot straight through,” Capt. Joseph Wells tells CNN. “The bullet entered her lower back and exited through her abdominal area. It went through her and we recovered the round inside the vehicle. It was a .45 caliber [handgun].”
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Officials haven’t been able to speak to Jamie yet due to her hospitalization, but she might be in legal trouble. A statement released by the Putnam County Sheriff’s Office on Wednesday points out that Florida law makes it a misdemeanor for anyone to store or leave a loaded gun in a place where a child could access it.
Worth noting: Jamie has since made her Facebook page private.
Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, part of Everytown for Gun Safety, tells WomensHealthMag.com that the situation is “tragic” but “entirely preventable.”
“While this mother survived, she and her son will have to live with the aftermath of this traumatic shooting,” Watts says. “Unintentional child shootings happen entirely too frequently in our country. That's why it's up to us—parents, gun owners and non-gun owners alike—to responsibly store firearms so that curious children don't get their hands on them."
According to Everytown for Gun Safety data, there have already been 48 unintentional incidences of children shooting people in 2016, with 27 injuries and 21 deaths.
