GUN GOOFS
A friendly reminder that a firearm is not a thing to be trifled with. The outcomes of these stories could have been a whole lot worse.
THE RIGHT TO BEAR ARMADILLOS
In 2015 a Georgia man named Larry McElroy had an unwanted armadillo digging up his rural property, so he got out his 9-mm pistol, took aim, and fired. Predictibly, the bullet bounced off the animal’s armored shell. Unpredictibly, the ricochet hit a fence, then went through the back door of McElroy’s mother-in-law’s trailer, and hit her square in the back (after passing through a recliner). Carol Johnson (the mother-in-law) suffered only minor injuries. The local sheriff’s office offered this advice: “[If you’re] going to shoot at varmints and whatnot, maybe use a shotgun.”
A Texas man also tried to shoot an armadillo in 2015. At around 3:00 a.m., he grabbed his .38 revolver, stormed outside, and fired three shots at the animal. One of the bullets bounced back and hit the man right in the face. The armadillo wandered away, and the man’s shattered jaw had to be wired shut.
TEACHER, TEACH THYSELF
The lesson that day in March 2018 was gun safety. Dennis Alexander, a high school math teacher and reserve police officer in Seaside, California, told his students the first thing is to make sure the gun isn’t loaded. But pointing it at the ceiling and pulling the trigger is probably not the best way to do that. Thinking the chamber was empty, that’s what Alexander did. A mass of ceiling debris came down on the neck of a 17-year-old student. But the teen said he was okay, and no one else was hurt, so Alexander continued the lesson. He even let the kids hold the unloaded weapon and take selfies with it. It wasn’t until after school, when the injured student arrived home with blood on his shirt and pieces of the ceiling (and possibly some bullet fragments) lodged in his neck, that the incident was reported to the police. Alexander was ultimately not charged with a crime, but he’s no longer a teacher. Or a police officer.
DOOR PRIZE
“I blew my arm off,” lamented a 68-year-old North Carolina man in a really depressing 911 call. Here’s how he did it: When he stepped out of his back door to feed the squirrels, he triggered a trip wire, which set off a shotgun that shot him in the arm. The booby-trap was one of several he set up on his land to thwart (according to his warning sign out front) “all you crack heads, meth heads, heroin users, drug dealers, or anyone doing criminal activity!” An ambulance arrived and took him to the hospital. It’s unclear from press reports if doctors were able to save his arm, or if the squirrels ever got fed.
Only primate with a venomous bite: the slow loris.
“Florida man sits on gun, accidentally shoots self in genitals,” read the actual news headline. The Florida man was Cedrick Jelks. One morning in July 2017, he was getting into his car when he sat down…and the gun went off. He ran screaming into his girlfriend’s bathroom, and she rushed him to the hospital. Emergency surgery was somewhat successful, but Jelks, 38, had other problems. Due to a 2004 conviction, he cannot legally possess a firearm. At last report, he was looking at a minimum of three years in prison.
In November 2018, a man (unnamed in press reports) was shopping in the Buckeye, Arizona, Walmart when the semiautomatic handgun he keeps unholstered in his pants started to slip. As he tried to readjust the gun, it went off, sputtering a bunch of rounds into his manhood. According to the Arizona Republic, “Police found the man in the meat section of the Walmart with survivable injuries.”
NOT MUCH OF A MULTITASKER
Rorn Sorn was in the men’s room of a Florida strip club in 2017 when he tried to take a mean-looking selfie. But holding up his handgun while aiming his phone back at himself proved a bit too much to handle, and the gun fired. The bullet pierced the stall wall and went into the ladies’ room, which (this being a strip club) was empty. In addition to the .40-caliber firearm, Sorn, 34, also had in his possession a gun magazine, some marijuana, and a container of Xanax pills. That, along with a rap sheet that included burglary and attempted murder, got him sentenced to six years in prison.
FLIPPING BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION
An FBI agent did a backflip and shot an innocent bystander. Ta-da! It happened in a Denver, Colorado, nightclub in July 2018. A 29-year-old off-duty agent named Chase Bishop (which sounds like it came from a TV writer) was “cutting it up” on the dance floor. When a crowd gathered around, cheering him on, he attempted the acrobatic dance move. Bad move. As soon as Agent Bishop’s feet got over his head, his service weapon fell out of his pants and landed on the floor. He lunged to pick it up, and it fired a bullet into the left leg of Thomas Reddington, 24, who was sitting at a nearby table. “It’s bizarre,” Reddington told ABC News. “Beyond bizarre. It’s beyond comprehension I think right now for me, just with all the factors involved.” Agent Bishop (who was legally allowed to carry a concealed weapon) pled guilty to third-degree assault in order to avoid jail time. It’s not known whether he’s still employed by the FBI. As for Reddington, he’s been left with a permanent injury to his leg, but he said he doesn’t hold a grudge against Bishop: “I’ve done stupid things at bars to impress girls, too.”
What’s cryptophasia? The language twins invent to talk to each other.