A three-year-old boy from Greenville, South Carolina was killed last Friday night (Feb 1) after he was shot in the head while playing with a pink gun he thought was a toy.
According to Greenville police, Tmorej Smith and his 7-year-old sister Taliyah were at their home at the Plantations at Haywood apartments when they came across a pink handgun, which they believed to be a toy.
Their parents weren’t home at the time, but police say their grandparents were in the living room.
As the two siblings were playing around with the gun, it went off and Temorej was fatally shot in the head. He was pronounced dead on the scene by the time police arrived.
While police haven’t revealed who fired the weapon, they ruled the shooting an accidental homicide, and are urging gun owners to keep their weapons locked away and hidden from young children.
“If you have guns, if you own guns mostly we would prefer you have them in a lock box,” said Johnathan Bragg, a spokesman for the Greenville Police Department. “At least have them out of the reach of children.”
Bragg told Greenville’s WYFF4 that no one was in custody, and that the investigation was ongoing.
Funeral services for Tmorej were held Wednesday afternoon (Feb 6) at Golden View Baptist Church in nearby Fountain Inn.
Local activist Jack Logan, founder of the group “Put the Guns Down Young People,” passed out nearly 60 gun locks at a Burger King just down the street from where the shooting happened.
“I didn’t want to see parents having guns laying around when a child could maybe get his or her hands on a gun,” Logan said.
