A mother driving down a Milwaukee highway was fatally shot Tuesday morning when her child, who was in the back seat of the vehicle, got his hands on a gun, police said.
The mother, 26-year-old Patrice Price, was driving a car belonging to her security guard boyfriend on Interstate 41/U.S. 175 southbound and was shot around 10:30 a.m., the Milwaukee County Sheriff's Office said in a statement.
"Initial witness accounts indicate that a child in the back seat of the vehicle got a hold of a gun and discharged the firearm, sending a single bullet into the drivers back," the sheriff's office said.
First responders arrived on the scene soon after the shooting and found her without a pulse and breathless. She was pronounced dead at the scene.
The investigation into the shooting is ongoing, the MCSO said. There has been some progress in the case, however, and testimony indicates that Price's boyfriend had left the gun in the vehicle and her 2-year-old son was able to reach it and accidentally shoot her.
Even if the shooting was an accident, that fact is of little solace to Price's family. Speaking to the media about the shooting, Andre Price, Patrice's father, said that his daughter was a hard-working mother who had three children.
"Now I don't have her no more," he said. "My chest has been hurting. I have a knot in my chest. They won't even let me see my daughter. I wanted to hold my daughter for one last time."
This is the latest incident involving a child who managed to get their hands on a firearm and accidentally shoot their parent. Just last month, 31-year-old Jamie Gilt of Florida was shot by her 4-year-old son under circumstances that are nearly identical to this one. Authorities believe that she may have put the firearm under the edge of the driver's side seat and it slid to the back while the vehicle was in motion, allowing him to grab hold of it and fire.
Gilt survived the shooting, but authorities are contemplating filing charges against her.
In the meantime, southbound lanes of the Interstate 41/U.S. 175 were closed for several hours after the shooting, but they have since reopened.
