A two-year-old boy (yes, 2) accidentally shot and killed his mother with a concealed weapon at a Walmart store this week, local police authorities say.
The toddler reached into his mom’s purse inside a northern Idaho Walmart, grabbing her concealed gun and firing it, officials confirmed on Tuesday.
Veronica J. Rutledge, 29, was killed by the blast.
She was with her son and three other children, Kootenai County sheriff’s spokesman Stu Miller said. Rutledge, of Blackfoot, Id., was in the area visiting relatives.
Rutledge did have a concealed weapons permit.
Tragically, what she didn’t have was the foresight to keep it from the boy, who was left in a shopping cart, reached into her purse and grabbed the weapon.
The small-caliber handgun was fired just once.
"It appears to be a pretty tragic accident," Miller said, adding that deputies who responded to the Walmart after a 911 call found Rutledge dead on arrival.
The victim’s father-in-law, Terry Rutledge, told the media that Veronica "was a beautiful, young, loving mother … she was not the least bit irresponsible."
"She was taken much too soon."
Rutledge’s husband was not in the store when the shooting happened at about 10:20 a.m. All of the couple’s children were taken to a relative’s house.
The shooting occurred in the Walmart in Hayden, Idaho. Brooke Buchanan, a spokeswoman for the retailer, called it a "very sad and tragic accident."
Company officials say the store was closed on Tuesday in the wake of the shooting but may reopen as soon as today. The investigation is ongoing.
Hayden is a town of about 9,000 near Coeur d’Alene, in Idaho’s northern panhandle, an area where Second Amendment rights are held particularly dear.
Idaho lawmakers passed legislation earlier this year allowing concealed weapons to be carried on the state’s public college and university campuses.
