In order to participate in the GunBroker Member forums, you must be logged in with your GunBroker.com account. Click the sign-in button at the top right of the forums page to get connected.
Top cop gets a painful lesson in gun safety
Josey1
Member Posts: 9,598 ✭✭
Top cop gets a painful lesson in gun safety
By Jay Braman Jr., Correspondent July 11, 2002
McGrath
Shandaken Police Officer-in-Charge James McGrath is home from Westchester Medical Center recuperating from a bullet wound in his left leg, but is still unable to work.
McGrath suffered a serious leg injury Saturday when his pistol accidentally went off in his home, discharging a round into his upper left thigh.
"I've never been shot before. Let me tell you, it hurts," he said this week while resting at home. "I thought I was going to go in to work today, but I couldn't. I pushed too much yesterday and I'm feeling it."
McGrath said it is expected he will have a complete recovery, but right now he is concerned over the "pins-and-needles" feeling in his foot, indicating some nerve damage. His doctors expect the nerves damaged by the 9mm hollow- point bullet to regenerate, he said.
"I was really lucky. That bullet is made to do lots of flesh damage. I think the plastic from the gun case filled the hole in the bullet before it went into my leg and kept it from breaking up in there," he said Tuesday.
McGrath said he was returning several of his personally owned handguns to their cases in his den when the accident occurred. He said he has several pistols of the same model, each with its own specific case, and he was shuffling the guns around to find the right serial numbers to match their respective cases. He was aware one gun was loaded, he said, but picked one up thinking it was an unloaded gun and put in a case. The trigger was bumped and the weapon fired, he said.
Luckily, McGrath said, the bullet passed right through his flesh and missed any bone or arteries.
"It went right through my leg, and I saw it come out. It lodged right in my couch," he said.
McGrath, who has 22 years of firearms training and carries a gun every day, is astonished that it even happened, and jokes that he suffered from a "brain fart" when the accident occurred.
"It'll never happen again, I can tell you that," he added.
Shandaken Supervisor Peter DiModica said Monday that if something like that could happen to McGrath, it could happen to anybody. A woodworker by trade, DiModica recounted an experience he had involving a power saw that almost cut off his fingers. After years and years of safely operating the device, one second's lack of awareness was all it took for an accident to occur, he said.
DiModica said he learned a valuable lesson, and is certain that no such incident will ever occur again.
"I'm sure Jimmy will always remember this, and be even safer because of it," he said.
McGrath was transported by helicopter to Westchester Medical Center for treatment and released.
Usually the one on the helping end in emergencies, McGrath was impressed by the response to his accident.
"I was at the medical center in Westchester within one hour of being shot," he said. "It's good to know that even when you live up here, far away from everything, that there are people and equipment that can get you what you need that fast."
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=4704418&BRD=1769&PAG=461&dept_id=74969&rfi=6
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
By Jay Braman Jr., Correspondent July 11, 2002
McGrath
Shandaken Police Officer-in-Charge James McGrath is home from Westchester Medical Center recuperating from a bullet wound in his left leg, but is still unable to work.
McGrath suffered a serious leg injury Saturday when his pistol accidentally went off in his home, discharging a round into his upper left thigh.
"I've never been shot before. Let me tell you, it hurts," he said this week while resting at home. "I thought I was going to go in to work today, but I couldn't. I pushed too much yesterday and I'm feeling it."
McGrath said it is expected he will have a complete recovery, but right now he is concerned over the "pins-and-needles" feeling in his foot, indicating some nerve damage. His doctors expect the nerves damaged by the 9mm hollow- point bullet to regenerate, he said.
"I was really lucky. That bullet is made to do lots of flesh damage. I think the plastic from the gun case filled the hole in the bullet before it went into my leg and kept it from breaking up in there," he said Tuesday.
McGrath said he was returning several of his personally owned handguns to their cases in his den when the accident occurred. He said he has several pistols of the same model, each with its own specific case, and he was shuffling the guns around to find the right serial numbers to match their respective cases. He was aware one gun was loaded, he said, but picked one up thinking it was an unloaded gun and put in a case. The trigger was bumped and the weapon fired, he said.
Luckily, McGrath said, the bullet passed right through his flesh and missed any bone or arteries.
"It went right through my leg, and I saw it come out. It lodged right in my couch," he said.
McGrath, who has 22 years of firearms training and carries a gun every day, is astonished that it even happened, and jokes that he suffered from a "brain fart" when the accident occurred.
"It'll never happen again, I can tell you that," he added.
Shandaken Supervisor Peter DiModica said Monday that if something like that could happen to McGrath, it could happen to anybody. A woodworker by trade, DiModica recounted an experience he had involving a power saw that almost cut off his fingers. After years and years of safely operating the device, one second's lack of awareness was all it took for an accident to occur, he said.
DiModica said he learned a valuable lesson, and is certain that no such incident will ever occur again.
"I'm sure Jimmy will always remember this, and be even safer because of it," he said.
McGrath was transported by helicopter to Westchester Medical Center for treatment and released.
Usually the one on the helping end in emergencies, McGrath was impressed by the response to his accident.
"I was at the medical center in Westchester within one hour of being shot," he said. "It's good to know that even when you live up here, far away from everything, that there are people and equipment that can get you what you need that fast."
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=4704418&BRD=1769&PAG=461&dept_id=74969&rfi=6
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Comments
Guns only have two enemies: Rust and Liberals....
"The powers delegated by the proposed constitution to the federal governmentare few and defined, and will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace negotiation, and foreign commerce"
-James Madison
I wonder if this was one of those highly safe pistols where it presses the trigger when you put it in it's little black Tupperware TV dinner box?