Comments on: Four-year-old boy believed to have shot, killed two-year-old sister in Limón https://www.insidecostarica.com/2015/06/04/four-year-old-boy-believed-shot-killed-two-year-old-sister-limon/ Costa Rica's Leading English Language News Source Tue, 28 Oct 2025 04:55:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.6.2 By: Ken Morrishttps://www.insidecostarica.com/2015/06/04/four-year-old-boy-believed-shot-killed-two-year-old-sister-limon/#comment-11313 Ken Morris Fri, 05 Jun 2015 04:05:00 +0000 http://insidecostarica.com/?p=18008#comment-11313 I’m afraid that many parents do this, and don’t imagine that a kid less than a meter tall would ever find the gun, much less be able to shoot it. Also, from your story, the parents seem to have believed that the gun was well-hidden, while the father, who I’d guess was the responsible party, was in the hospital at the time for an emergency.

Negligence? Maybe. But I doubt more negligence than parents leaving exposed electric sockets or rat poison or matches around. And how can we accuse a father of negligence when he’s in the hospital?

I have to assume that the parents are devastated, as also may be the less-than-a-meter tall boy, and will blame themselves forever. The way to handle this is NOT to remove the kid from the house, unless there is some other reason to do this.

Basically, parents screw up in all kinds of ways. Most of us are lucky and don’t suffer these kinds of consequences from our screw ups. Neither do we appear to be looking at an armed-to-the-teeth self-styled militiaman crazy, just a guy who left a .22 rifle hidden from his kids he believed were too young to find it and was in the hospital himself anyway. Maybe as a rule he didn’t leave it loaded, just happened to that day after being bitten by the snake.

I’m a big believer in big government, but I seriously doubt that government bureaucrats taking the kid is the right thing to do in this situation. We seem to be looking at parents who made a tragic mistake, which can happen to any parent, not bad parents.

]]> By: Timothy Williamshttps://www.insidecostarica.com/2015/06/04/four-year-old-boy-believed-shot-killed-two-year-old-sister-limon/#comment-11301 Timothy Williams Thu, 04 Jun 2015 19:07:00 +0000 http://insidecostarica.com/?p=18008#comment-11301 Maybe because they left a (loaded) rifle where a 4-year-old could get to it? He can’t be but a meter tall.

]]> By: Ken Morrishttps://www.insidecostarica.com/2015/06/04/four-year-old-boy-believed-shot-killed-two-year-old-sister-limon/#comment-11300 Ken Morris Thu, 04 Jun 2015 19:03:00 +0000 http://insidecostarica.com/?p=18008#comment-11300 I’m not following the rationale for PANI taking the boy, at least assuming he rather than the mother fired the gun. Insofar as PANI intervenes, it should probably help the family cope with the tragedy and heal as a unit, not break it apart.

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