U.S. father fatally shoots son mistaken for intruder
The tragic accident occurred in the morning at a home in Cincinnati when the father fired his handgun into the basement, where he heard suspicious noise which he believed to be made by an intruder hiding inside, the reports said.
The victim was actually his 14-year-old son, who returned home through the back door after being dropped off by his father at the school bus stop earlier in the morning, Xinhua reports.
The father made a 911 call requesting emergency medical treatment of his son, who was sent to the Cincinnati Children's Hospital.
But the boy, identified as Georta Mack, died in the hospital later from the gun wounds at his neck.
This is another similar tragedy recently involving families members fatally shot after being mistaken for intruder, highlighting another side of the malice of gun violence in the United States.
On Dec. 29, a mother in the U.S. state of Florida shot and killed her daughter, who was mistaken for an intruder when she was visiting her mother for the new year holiday from the state of North Carolina.
The mother, from St. Cloud in central Florida, fired a single shot to kill her 27-year-old daughter after hearing someone entering her home.
The mother, a 9-11 dispatcher, was also sent to hospital for treatment due to shock and grief.
Proliferation of guns and easy access to such lethal weapons have become a social disease in the U.S., while the gun-control efforts have virtually hit a wall due to strong opposition from the firearms manufacturers and influential gun lobbyist groups.
It is estimated that there are about 357 million guns in the U.S., and more than 33,000 people were killed annually by run-related criminal acts, terror attacks or homicides.