A Tennessee man accidentally shot himself and his wife inside their church after they attended a discussion about recent church shootings with members of the congregation.
Elder members of the First United Methodist Church in Tellico Plains met for a Thanksgiving luncheon on Thursday. During the fellowship, they talked about the Nov. 5 attack on a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, where a gunman killed 26 people, including an unborn child.
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During the discussion, a member asked if anyone had brought a gun to their church.
“I carry my handgun everywhere,” one man in his eighties told the group, Tellico Plains Police Chief Russ Parks recalled of the situation to Knox News.
He removed the magazine, cleared the chamber and showed the gun to some members. He put the magazine back in, apparently loaded a round in the chamber and put the gun back in its holster.
“Somebody else walked up and said, ‘Can I see it?’ ” Parks said. “He pulled it back out and said, ‘With this loaded indicator, I can tell that it’s not loaded.’ ” The gun owner pulled the trigger to show it was not loaded but he “just forgot that he re-chambered the weapon,” Parks said.
The gun fired, hitting the gun owner in his hand and striking his wife in the abdomen.
Both victims were transported to University of Tennessee Medical Center by helicopter, though they sustained non-life threatening injuries.
After the incident, the Telico Plains Police Department issued a statement on Facebook to inform residents of the town of the shooting.
“Just want to let everyone know that there was a shooting in town today. But it was not an active shooter situation. It was an accidentally discharged handgun,” the department wrote on Thursday. “No other people were harmed in this accident.”
Police added that local schools “were placed in a temporary lockdown for the students’ safety,” but the security measure was lifted once the situation was controlled.
Charges will not be filed in the matter, Parks told local news.
