Arizona gun range reviewing policies after nine-year-old kills instructor

Arizona Last Stop gun range, where visitors can shoot machine guns, considering changes including raising age limit

theguardian.com, Lauren Gambino in New York, Wednesday 27 August 2014

Shooting instructor Charles Vacca stands next to the nine-year-old girl, in this still
image taken from the video. Photograph: Mohave County Sheriff Office/Reuters

The manager of an Arizona shooting range where a nine-year-old girl accidentally shot and killed her instructor with an Uzi said he has trained children as young as five on the use of firearms but the range’s policies on minors is currently under review.

Sam Scarmardo, a manager at the Arizona Last Stop gun range, told the Guardian that the range is reviewing the incident, and is considering policy changes, including raising the age limit and imposing a height and weight requirement.

“We train kids as young as 5 years old on the use of single shot .22 rifles in our youth safety classes,” he said. “In 13 years we’ve never handed out a Bandaid to anyone let alone have something like this happen” he said.

Mohave County Sheriff’s deputies said Charles Vacca, 39, of Lake Havasu City, Arizona, was shot at least once in the head on Monday while training the girl how to fire the gun. He was airlifted to a nearby hospital in Nevada where he died from his injuries on Monday night.

Scarmardo said Vacca, who served in the Army, had worked at the Last Stop gun range for a year and a half. The girl, whose name has not been released, was visiting the range with her parents from New Jersey.

Scarmardo would not comment or confirm specific details of the incident. He would not talk about the range’s current policy on minors firing guns, but said it followed the law and was in step with other shooting ranges in the area. Some packages listed on the Last Stop website require children to be at least eight years old and stipulate that minors under 18 must be accompanied by a parent or legal guardian at all times.

Arizona law prohibits minors from possessing a firearm unless they are accompanied by a parent, guardian or an instructor, among other exceptions. Deputies said the nine-year-old girl was at the shooting range with her parents.

While the incident is under investigation, Scarmardo said children are currently prohibited from shooting at the range.

The Mohave County Sheriff’s office released a video of the incident apparently captured on a phone by the girl’s parents, which it provided to the Guardian.

The video shows a raven-haired girl wearing hot pink shorts and ear muffs gripping the Uzi in her hands as she takes aim at a silhouette target. Before she shoots, Vacca adjusts her stance, and places one of his hands under the gun and the other behind the girl’s back. She fires once, hitting the dirt beside the target.

“Alright!” Vacca says cheerfully. Then he switches the settings from “single-shot” to “fully automatic”, and shouts: “Alright. Full auto.” She fires several rounds rapidly, and the video cuts.

Investigators said that when the girl pulled the trigger on the automatic Uzi, the recoil sent the gun over her head. Vacca was shot at least once in the head. It is unclear how many shots were fired. The sheriff’s office said in an email to the Guardian that they are not providing any more information than has already been released at this time.

The sheriff’s office said deputies responded to the incident around 10am on Monday. Vacca was airlifted to a medical center in Las Vegas, Nevada, where he died from injuries later that night. Scarmardo said Vacca’s wife was by his side at the hospital.

Based on the video, no charges will be filed against the shooting range, Mohave County Sheriff’s office spokeswoman Trish Carter said in the email.

Carter said the incident is being viewed as an industrial accident, and so the Occupational Safety and Health Administration is conducting an investigation. She said the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has been notified.

The autopsy will be performed by the Clark County Medical Examiner’s Office in Nevada.

Arizona Last Stop is a roughly 30-acre property in the Mohave desert, located off the stretch of highway between Las Vegas and the Grand Canyon Skywalk. The location is meant to create a “Desert Storm” atmosphere for shooters, its website said on Tuesday.

At the range, shooters can choose their firearm among a range of fully automatic machine guns and specialty weapons. The website boasts: “At our range, you can shoot FULL auto on our machine guns. Let ‘em Rip!”

Scarmardo, the manager, said the employees at the range are tight-knit, and are very upset by the loss of their colleague.

“He was a great guy. He was like a brother,” Scarmardo said. “Everybody loved Charlie and everybody is going to miss him.”

A criminologist shows an "Uzi" submachine gun at the Criminology

 Laboratory on May 28, 2008 in Ciudad Juarez, north Mexico

(AFP Photo/Alfredo Estrella)

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