4-year-old girl shot in head, father arrested after loaded handgun left unattended

Alexandra Koch and Jeanine Santucci, USA TODAY NETWORK
·3 min read
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A Georgia father was arrested Monday after his 4-year-old daughter was shot in the head with a handgun he left loaded on the floor.

Davion Daniels, 24, was charged with cruelty to children in the second degree and possession of a machine gun, according to the Grovetown Police Department. Only one shot was fired, but investigators discovered the weapon was illegally modified to be fully automatic, police said.

"The investigation to this point indicates that the child picked up the weapon and inadvertently shot herself," Grovetown Police Chief Jamey Kitchens said in a statement.

Police urged residents to be responsible with their firearms, "especially when small children are present."

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Toddler shot while dad was on the phone

Just before 5:45 p.m. Monday, Columbia County Sheriff's Office dispatch notified the local police department about a possible shooting in Grovetown, a city of about 17,000 residents in the Augusta metro area.

Columbia County dispatch told the department one of their units was flagged down by two adults in a car trying to bring a 4-year-old girl with a gunshot wound to a hospital, according to a news release from the police department.

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Investigators said the toddler was in an apartment with her father, Daniels, and several others at the time of the shooting, according to the department. Daniels admitted to placing a loaded 9mm Glock handgun on the floor while he went downstairs to take a phone call.

Daniels told police that shortly after going downstairs, he heard a gunshot and ran upstairs to find the toddler with a wound to the head, according to the release. Daniels and a family member put the child in the car and began driving to the hospital when they encountered the Columbia County Sheriff’s Office unit.

The child is in critical condition, according to the department. Daniels was taken to the Columbia County Detention Center and additional charges are pending.

More than 100 accidental shootings by children so far in 2023

Gun safety experts have sounded the alarm about children accessing unsecured guns owned by their parents and caregivers and accidentally hurting themselves or others. Research by the advocacy group Everytown for Gun Safety shows that so far in 2023, there have been at least 122 accidental shootings by children in the United States, resulting in 53 deaths and 71 injuries.

An estimated 4.6 million children in the country were living in a home with at least one unlocked and loaded gun in 2021, according to a study using data from the National Firearm Survey.

Grovetown police said the incident was "totally avoidable."

Georgia is not one of the 25 states with laws requiring safe storage of firearms to prevent children from accessing them, according to Everytown for Gun Safety's tracker. A bill to add stricter penalties for gun owners when their firearms fall into unsupervised kids' hands didn't make it past a Georgia legislative subcommittee earlier this year, Fox 5 Atlanta reported.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY NETWORK: Georgia man arrested after daughter shot by handgun left unattended