Deaths of two Colorado 5-year-olds spur calls for care with guns
Officials have renewed warnings for adults to be careful with guns around children after two Colorado 5-year-olds died in accidental shootings Friday and Monday.
New details emerged Tuesday in Friday's death, when a 3-year-old in Lakewood killed his 5-year-old brother with a family friend's gun.
Adam Laham, 23, of Wichita, the owner of the gun, was being held in the Jefferson County jail on suspicion of child abuse resulting in death and criminal negligence.
Family friends in Wichita told local TV station KSN News that Laham had been target shooting and left the loaded gun in the parents' bedroom.
Laham, the parents and other adults were in the living room when they heard the gunshot.
The children were in the bedroom playing video games when the younger child found the gun and shot his brother at point-blank range, the station reported.
Laham's friends, who weren't identified in the TV story, said the 3-year-old was still holding the gun when the adults came running in response to the gunshot.
The court case file is under seal, and Lakewood police have declined to discuss the details of the shooting.
Monday night in Fremont County, 5-year-old Ruth Joy Wilson fatally shot herself with her father's .45-caliber handgun, investigators there say.
Her parents and an infant sibling were in another room of the home in the High Park Ranch area about 10 miles north of Cañon City.
Fremont County sheriff's Capt. Don Pinover said the family is traumatized by the accident. The district attorney's office will decide whether criminal charges are appropriate, he said.
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