He’s a best-case scenario, doing it right;
He knows it’s a gun, not a toy
The most dangerous thing in his bedroom that night
Was a visiting 4-year-old boy

You mustn’t be tempted to regulate arms
Which the second amendment forbids
It can’t shoot itself, so a gun never harms
But it’s clear—we must regulate kids.

Whenever the news tells us of an incident where a kid shoots someone, the comment sections are reliably filled with people noting the idiocy of whoever allowed that kid access to firearms. Such irresponsible people make responsible gun owners look bad–and the vast majority of gun owners are responsible.

Mind you, we don’t actually know some of the numbers it would take to make that claim–you might recall, the CDC is expressly forbidden from gathering and analyzing gun death information. Seems the NRA got to write the legislation. But in those comment threads, gun accidents happen only to irresponsible idiots, and normal, responsible gun ownership makes your family safer.

But this time, the gun owner is a well-trained Sheriff’s Deputy. And he wants to set things straight:

“I would like the viewers to know that officers of Wilson County do not make a habit of leaving loaded guns simply lying around,” he wrote.
“The door to the room the accident happened in stays locked unless we were sleeping or we were in it,” Fanning wrote. “This was the only loaded gun in the house other than my duty weapon, which was locked away.”
Wilson County Sheriff Robert Bryan said Fanning had been showing “another person that was there at the house some of his weapons he had locked in a secure gun safe,” reported CNN affiliate WTVF.
No one saw the boy enter the room, WTVF quoted Bryan as saying.
“Split second,” Bryan said. “We’re talking about seconds for that kid to walk in that room unbeknownst to them, grab that gun and it goes off.”
“He took all the precautions, he’s a trained law enforcement officer, trains with weapons all the time.”

This guy did everything right. And his wife is dead.

I can guarantee you one thing. His claims of gun safety and training will amount to utterly nothing in the comment threads; guns are safe in responsible hands, ergo he was irresponsible.