Family ‘devastated’ when toddler finds gun in dad’s bed — and pulls the trigger, cops say

A sleeping dad woke up to a horrific scene Thursday when his 2-year-old toddler discovered a loaded handgun in his bed and accidentally shot himself in Clayton County, Georgia, WSB reported.

Police said the 31-year-old father was asleep in his bed around noon in Jonesboro when his toddler walked into his room and crawled into the bed, according to Fox 5.

The dad didn’t wake up, and the mother was asleep in another room of the house, according to the station.

Police said the boy rummaged around the bed and somehow found a loaded handgun stashed underneath his father’s pillow, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. One shot was fired, and the boy was hit, according to the paper.

He was rushed to a hospital where doctors struggled to save him, but he died shortly after arriving, police spokesman Scott Stubbs said at a news conference.

Stubbs said the shooting was “just an unfortunate, devastating situation,” according to News-Daily, and that the family was “devastated” and was cooperating with investigators. No charges have been filed, and a medical examiner will perform an autopsy on the body, according to the paper.

The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia Research Institute estimates that about 1.7 million children live in homes with unlocked, loaded weapons, and about 90 percent of accidental shooting deaths among children occur in the home, often when a child plays with a gun when a parent isn’t around.

An analysis by USA Today and The Associated Press found that a child was killed in a gun accident about once every other day in the United States.

Stubbs said in the news conference that such accidents were devastating not only for the family, but for the emergency responders who arrive to help.

“We always encourage everyone, if you have small children or anybody that can get access to a firearm, that you use necessary precautions to keep that firearm safe,” Stubbs said.