This is so wrong. The punishment for leaving your car running in Aurora is far more severe than the penalty for leaving a gun lying around — even if a child finds it and shoots another kid with it.

If you leave your car running on a cold winter day, and it gets stolen, you lose your car and gain a $75 ticket for what the cops call “puffing.” That’s their term of endearment for people who start their cars and then run back inside, leaving it to puff white fumes as the car warms up.

Each year, hundreds of cars in the area are stolen by puffer opportunists. Because the foolish behavior can lead to a crime being committed, you get the ticket because it’s seen as nearly aiding and abetting.

So what’s more criminally negligent than an unattended running car? A gun in a unattended home with children, but not in Aurora.

But in Aurora, you can leave a gun and ammunition in a house with kids, tucked out of sight, and rest assured the Arapahoe County District Attorney’s office won’t prosecute you, even if your own kid finds the gun and accidentally shoots himself or someone else with it.

Last week, Arapahoe County Assistant District Attorney Mark Hurlbert said that office would not file charges against an Aurora man whose 12-year-old son found his father’s gun inside a coat pocket, discovered the bullets elsewhere in the house, got the gun out when he had some pals over and his parents weren’t home, and ended up inadvertently shooting a 7-year-old boy in the head two weeks ago.

The younger boy was critically injured, but his condition nor prognosis aren’t particularly clear, other than he is expected to survive.

Hurlbert said there isn’t enough evidence to charge either the boy who fired the gun while playing with it, nor his father, who said he had no idea that his son even knew there was a gun in the house.

The father told police that he had “hidden” the gun inside the pocket of a jacket hanging inside a closet. He said he stored a clip and ammunition separately. And the Arapahoe County DA says that’s good enough to protect children from doing the unthinkable, such as finding the gun, the ammunition and playing with it while the parents are away and shooting someone.

That absolutely is not good enough. It was criminally irresponsible, or it should be.

My heart goes out the dad who now must live with this the rest of his life, knowing that if he’d only really secured the gun and ammunition, this wouldn’t have happened. My heart breaks for his son and the younger boy shot as a result of the negligence. I can’t imagine something like this, but I can’t imagine leaving a gun in the house with a kid, at least one that doesn’t have a trigger lock.

About half of the more than 1 million homes with children and guns in the United States don’t have locked and unloaded weapons. And a report by Everytown for Gun Safety cites an unnerving but hardly surprising Harvard University survey of children in homes with guns. The study reveals that “more than 70 percent of children under age 10 knew where their parents stored their guns — even when they were hidden — and 36 percent of the children reported handling the weapons.”

Even though the Arapahoe County DA considers keeping a gun in a coat pocket good enough security to avoid criminal charges, clearly that strategy isn’t good enough to keep kids from getting injured or killed.

We don’t know how serious the problem really is because powerful gun lobbies prevent the federal government from accurately analyzing gun violence. But we do know that about 100 kids a year are killed accidentally by other kids with guns, sometimes even toddlers, and they shoot adults as well. As to the number of close calls each year? That’s anyone’s guess. With 1.7 million homes with children and guns, you know the very real danger of injury or death is in the thousands each year. Massachusetts is the only state with the good sense and courage to require gun locks on all guns when the owner is away from the house — regardless of whether they have kids. So far.

As my own daughter was growing up, I was first surprised and amused when parents would bring her pals over to play and start asking about guns in the house. Most were sheepish, but a few were candid about their concern and my response.

I don’t dislike nor fear guns, and I grew up shooting them for fun down home in the Arkansas Valley and hunting for rabbits and coyotes on the grasslands. But living in the city, I have no need for a gun. I constantly worried about my kid choking on grapes or hot dogs, so fretting about neighbors with guns came pretty easy. Everyone soon knew who in the neighborhood had hunting rifles or handguns in their homes, and who refused to let their kids play there. I don’t know anyone who has kids and guns in their homes without working gun locks. I absolutely know how stupid it would be to permit such a thing.

Because children are unable to protect themselves, state law watches over them, requiring car seats, inoculations and even rules about secondhand smoke. How could it be that either Colorado law doesn’t clearly spell out what’s safe and unsafe gun storage with children in the house, or the Arapahoe County DA refuses to press it? Because clearly kids will find these guns, and stashing them in coat pockets, under mattresses, in the sock drawer or even inside a purse clearly isn’t safe.

It’s time to change the law, preferably to something like that in Massachusetts, so gun owners know exactly what is expected of them and so district attorneys can’t look the other way.

Colorado’s kids are much more valuable than our cars. We should act like it.

Reach @EditorDavePerry on Twitter or Facebook, or email him at dperry@aurorasentinel.com.

20 replies on “PERRY: Whom do you have to shoot to press charges against negligent parents in Colorado?”

  1. Then why don’t we have chain link fences around our K12 schools, with limited access gates, where employee (armed or unarmed) would be stationed to check who comes and goes. Closed campus, no loitering, and enforced sign-in at main entrance would help. We have that around most of our business places or working factories, and it does work. I visited in Hawaii 2001 when my two grandsons was in school there, and they had that in effect then. We have armed guard in King Soopers and the SS office, also at DMV. Are the lives of our children not matter as much as adults. Or do you just like to write such pulp, over and over, blaming parents. Did you not get the memo that parents are not responsible for their children. State has taken over that authority and will tell us what to do.

    1. No, he likes to blame guns for killing people, he and other liberals are all against gun ownership, as they are all on board with ‘global warming’ and the EPA.

        1. I tried to communicate with that thing, it has no sense at all, I stopped trying, don’t pay one moments notice.

    2. It seems there are parents unable to use commonsense and protect their children. That’s how laws happen. Because people apparently need laws to do commonsense things. It’s safety.

      1. In your own words this wouldn’t be a law to get parents to do common sense things. It would purely be to punish those that are already suffering greater than any fine could do. Stop trying to legislate the inside of people homes.

  2. A parent loses a child. Then you want state sponsored terrorism to harass the grieving parents, until what end? Until they kill themselves and their children are in foster homes or better yet we could use valuable tax dollars to house and feed people that were perfectly self sufficient. Who cares right, just kick the family while its down so their children can grow up without parents and become criminals or killers. Let the family heal after a tragedy. What else can you take away from a parent after losing a child. People are more valuable than cars is right, we should stop locking them up every chance we get. Mass incarceration is bad, and we should start acting like it.

    1. How about a fine? How about we just say “this is what you need to do to be safe with a gun in the house.” and make that a law with at least a fine equal to driving without insurance? Obviously people are uneducated. “Mass incarceration” has nothing to do with this. We want parents to act safely.

      1. There is not a fine in the world that can be as great of consequence as losing a family member. What good does the fine do. Nothing. “We want parents to act safely.” What a joke, you are a joke. Adding some fine on top of a tragedy adds nothing. Maybe we should spend the money it takes to enforce something like this on ‘FREE’ gun safety classes. Maybe we can prevent something like this rather than making a senseless, useless law that helps no one. How do you enforce something like this before the police are involved? Do recommend passing a law like this, then having a police officer go into the home of every gun owner and check to make sure its locked up?

        1. I’m suggesting AFTER police are involved. A secondary law like seat belts.

          For instance, someone tragically is involved in a fatal accident. Even if it’s not their fault, a citation or a fine seems reasonable.

          It almost seems as though you’re fighting a war on safe use of firearms. If this gun has a trigger lock or was locked safely away, it would not have happened. Even if people don’t have common sense, they may indeed pay attention to a fine or possible loss of privileges. Not 100% compliance but they would stop and think.

  3. I agree. This is pure commonsense. I don’t dislike or fear guns having grown up with guns as well. We have so many laws, rules or simply standards for safety in nearly every other area. Yet, with guns, we seem afraid to use common sense and make a few common sense rules lest we be accused of fear or lack of knowledge.

    What concerns me is that many people no longer have a healthy respect for guns as we once did. These are completely preventable “accidents”.

    1. How does this prevent something from happening? Are the police going to search all gun owners to make sure the are properly storing their weapons? Or is this more likely to be used after something happens to punish someone? It seems like the lack of knowledge is something that could be prevented with a state provided gun safety course.

      1. The state does offer gun safety classes, called hunter safety. Private shooting ranges and self-defense instructors offer gun safety classes. If you want to own a gun, take a class.

        People get charged statewide with misdemeanor child abuse if they leave a kid unattended in a car, or wandering down the street. It happens every day.

        2. Other states offer state paid hunter safety courses. Massachusetts offers it. Sure makes a heck of a lot more sense than a $50 fine after someone has been shot.

      2. No, it would go something like this: the police officers who investigated the incident would give him a ticket and fine for not securing his gun properly. They were already in his home as they generally are for any shooting.

        There are plenty of cheap safety courses. You can’t tell me this happened because of a lack of money. Dad could afford a 9-millimeter pistol but could’t afford a few minutes to peruse the internet.

        1. So it doesn’t or would not prevent a accidental shooting. Just kicking a family when they are down after they either lost a child or a child has been seriously injured. Get a clue. If the state could offer hunters safety to this theoretical parent then maybe the shooting could be prevented instead of giving a useless heartless fine to an already grieving parents. Grow a heart Mr grinch.

      3. By the way, a gun lock — which cost around $5 — could have prevented the shooting. While those devices aren’t required, (police spokesman) Hurlbert said they are a wise purchase.

        Is it worth $5?

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