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Girl, nine, kills gun instructor

A nine year-old girl in the US has killed her shooting instructor by accident while being shown how to use a high-powered submachine gun.

The instructor was giving the girl a lesson at a shooting range in Arizona when the recoil from the automatic fire caused her to lose control of the Uzi. Charles Vacca, 39, was shot in the head and died after being airlifted to a hospital in Las Vegas. The girl was at the shooting range with her parents, who filmed the lesson.

The footage shows the instructor coaching her as she fires a single shot at a target at the Last Stop shooting range in White Hills, Arizona. The Uzi then appears to be switched to automatic as the girl pulls the trigger and loses her grip of the weapon.

The video, edited and released by the Mojave County Sheriff's office, ends abruptly before the instructor is shot. The website of the shooting range, called Bullets and Burgers, says children aged eight and older can shoot a weapon if they are accompanied by a parent.

Range operator Sam Scarmardo told Klas TV that they had never had an incident in the 12 years it has been open. "We really don't know what happened. Our guys are trained to basically hover over people when they're shooting," he said.

"If they're shooting right-handed, we have our right-hand behind them ready to push the weapon out of the way. And if they're left-handed, the same thing." Correspondents say it is common in parts of the US for children to be taught how to use firearms.

Many firing ranges have strict safety rules on instructing children.
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Comments

  • Make it more simple... Ban guns in America!!
  • edited August 2014
    More guns is surely the answer, at least that's what it usually is over there. Sorry to be glib it's just they'll never learn. Saw a documentary a while back about a boy (around 10) given a gun to go out hunting, things go wrong ends up shooting himself dead. The dad said something like he still doesn't think it's wrong for kids to use guns. Idiots.
  • 9 year old child handling submachine guns with live ammo ....?



  • There is absolutely no reason for a 9 year old to fire a gun.

    Such a strange situation it is almost funny until you consider that kid will be fucked up for life now and this guy didn't make it to 40.
  • I don't understand why a gun range would want a nine year old girl using a sub machine gun. I have, even more, concern as to what her parents thought was the benefit of it, to be honest.

    When I went to Vegas a few years ago I went so one of these gun ranges and I fired an MP5 and a handgun. I wasn't allowed to put the MP5 onto automatic fire and I am a lot older than nine.

    I'm not going to say anyone deserved what has happened, but my son is ten and I don't let him play with matches and, funnily enough, he has never set fire to anything.
  • The parents were filming the lesson! WTF?
    Nine....nine years old, sheesh, there is no justification or excuse is there?
    'Bullets and Burgers'....come on, that simply can't be true.
  • We share a language in common with Americans, but a lot of them are fucking crazy.
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  • Here are the parts of this story I am struggling with most...

    1. Why take a nine year-old to a shooting range?
    2. If you have a nine year-old at a shooting range, why do you give her a go with the guns?
    3. If you give her a go with the guns, why do you use live ammo?
    4. If you use live ammo, why use an Uzi sub machine gun?
    5. Is the "Range operator" demonstrating a full and complete grip on his role when he says, to a TV station, "our guys are basically trained to hover over people when they are shooting"?
    6. If "many" firing ranges have strict safety rules on instructing children, what do the rest have? Slighty less strict rules?

    and finally...

    7. If you do film your nine year-old daughter shooting a man in the head, try to avoid allowing the movie of it reaching the world's media.

  • Chizz said:

    7. If you do film your nine year-old daughter shooting a man in the head, try to avoid allowing the movie of it reaching the world's media. Until you've sorted out the copyright.

    EFA.

  • edited August 2014
    But in the States this is probably seen in the same light as going to the karting track or having a bunjee jump in this country. But when was the last time a karting instructor got run over?
  • I just had a quick look on youtube where part of the video is on there, one typical comment is saying that baseball bats and hammers can also kill people so should they be banned too?! I mean Jesus how can anything ever expect to change with mentalities like that.
  • Given a sufficient period of time without any outside influence (ie; some other nut job country wipes them out) I believe the good ole U S of A will remove themselves from the face of the earth, through natural selection.
  • Piers Morgan v that guns nutter on his chat show was the only time I've had any respect for him. That's how low an opinion I have of these NRA types.
  • I've just watched the YouTube video and it, clearly, stops before the fatal shot, although they continue the sound which is a little unnecessary, but it is frightening just how quickly the gun turns - and you see the instructor touch the gun, which I assume to be the 'auto' switch.

    My opinion about allowing a nine year old to take part in this activity hasn't changed, at all!
  • We share a language in common with Americans, but a lot of them are fucking crazy.

    The actual quote is " the Americans and British are divided by a common language" (Mark Twain, I believe, unless anybody was to correct me).
  • Why the hell did she have an Uzi?

    I can put up with a pistol or a rifle of some sorts, if she's from a hunting family, but a bloody uzi?
    Crazy.
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  • Saw this story earlier today and still really not sure whether to laugh or cry.

    I despair of a world that puts guns, weapons of any kind, in the hands of a child and thinks it's OK. And then, in America, of the idiots who try to defend it in any way they can to enable them to continue to exercise their constitutional right to bear arms and to force/share that right with their offspring.

    Someone mentioned natural selection earlier. Right to a certain extent, but they're likely to take a lot of innocent people along with them!

    I hope this child somehow gets through this experience and never has to hold/see/be involved with a gun again in her life. Little hope...sadly.
  • edited August 2014
    Why does everything like this always happen here?? Smh. Shit I'm moving to england
  • Rossman92 said:

    Why does everything like this always happen here?? Smh. Shit I'm moving to england

    Cos u got guns innit. Kmt
  • Addickted said:

    I shot our paintball instructor.

    Twice.

    But he was a Palace fan.

    ...did they ever found out who smuggled a real loaded gun in to the paintball arena?
  • Talal said:

    Rossman92 said:

    Why does everything like this always happen here?? Smh. Shit I'm moving to england

    Cos u got guns innit. Kmt
    Yeah the amendments kinda fucked a lot of stuff up
  • Rossman92 said:

    Talal said:

    Rossman92 said:

    Why does everything like this always happen here?? Smh. Shit I'm moving to england

    Cos u got guns innit. Kmt
    Yeah the amendments kinda fucked a lot of stuff up
    Should have got a Brit to draft them.
  • Addickted said:

    Rossman92 said:

    Talal said:

    Rossman92 said:

    Why does everything like this always happen here?? Smh. Shit I'm moving to england

    Cos u got guns innit. Kmt
    Yeah the amendments kinda fucked a lot of stuff up
    Should have got a Brit to draft them.
    We coulda had a millwall fan draft them, just take out anything that has to do with guns
  • Problem is a Millwall fan would struggle to spell 'amendment'.
  • Addickted said:

    Problem is a Millwall fan would struggle to spell 'amendment'.

    Could one of them even spell gun??
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