Range Incident
Here is an incident that just occured in NJ during police qualifications. The sad part is that such incidents, whoever is responsible can cause grief and possible closure of ranges.
Not only poor handling of a firearm but poor maintenance procedures.
Bullet penetrates window of Princeton Township home a mile away from firing range
An incident involving a bullet misfired from a police firearms training range that struck a Princeton Township residence a mile away has resulted in additional precautions at the practice facility in order to avoid the "one-in-a-million" chance of reoccurrence, acting Princeton Township Police Chief Mark Emann said Wednesday.
The precautions, which include officers now shooting through a 2-foot diameter water pipe to prevent a wayward bullet, come after an April 12 incident that is being investigated by township police in which a bullet penetrated the living room window of a Governors Lane home and landed within 10 feet of where resident Elise Nakhnikian was typing on her computer.
At about 1 p.m. that day, members of the Princeton Borough Police Department were practicing at the firearms range shared with the township off River Road in Princeton Township when a rifle malfunctioned, causing the weapon's firing pin to release and the cartridge to fire without the officer pulling the trigger, acting Chief Emann said.
The manufacturer has inspected the rifle and concluded that the misfire was the direct result of a faulty trigger on the Model 700 Remington, the acting chief noted.
Because of the angle of the rifle at the time of the malfunction, the bullet passed over the 60-foot protective berm that surround the range, and continued for a mile in a southwesterly direction towards Governors Lane, acting Chief Emann said. The bullet hit a metal railing outside the home, ricocheted upwards at about a 45-degree angle, entered the home through the front window and struck the crown molding around the ceiling, the acting chief said. "It struck that and fell down," he said.
Ms. Nakhnikian and her husband, Steven Gittelson, were home at the time of the incident — Ms. Nakhnikian said she was sitting within 10 feet of the bullet's path and Mr. Gittelson was in the next room making a phone call.
"I just heard this tremendous bang," Ms. Nakhnikian said. "I looked to my left and there was a hole in the window. I said to my husband, 'I think we just got shot at.'" The window is by the preferred seat of the couple's cat, Ms. Nakhnikian explained. "The bullet came in a little bit above where her head usually is," she said. Ms. Nakhnikian said she then went to get a stepladder to observe what happened but Mr. Gittelson warned her to stay put. The couple then called the police. "Once we received a call from the homeowner, we almost simultaneously got a call from the borough about the incident" at the practice facility, acting Chief Emann said. Police arrived at the Governors Lane home within minutes, but they did not instantly connect the misfired shot at the range with the one that entered the home a mile away. The two hours directly following the incident were the most frightening because, at that point, the origin of the bullet was unclear, Ms. Nakhnikian said. "That was really the scariest part," she said, adding that she worried that a sniper was involved and feared for the safety of herself and those around her.
At about 3 p.m., however, she said the chiefs of police for the borough, Anthony Federico, acting Chief Emann, arrived at her house to explain the cause of the incident. Acting Chief Emann said the investigation is ongoing, adding it is unlikely that the officer holding the gun — whom police have not identified — will be penalized. The misfire was confirmed by Remington engineers to be a direct result of the faulty weapon, the acting chief said. "We don't feel at this time that any action is going to be taken against the officer," he said.
Investigations by Remington engineers revealed that the gun was flawed because of a defective servicing it underwent from an outside company prior to the incident, Chief Federico said. According to Chief Federico, two Model 700 Remingtons owned by the borough police — including the weapon involved the April 12 incident — were found by Remington engineers to be defective as a result of an improper servicing by the same outside company. The guns are being sent back to Remington, where they will be fixed, Chief Federico said. Ms. Nakhnikian commended the actions taken by borough and township police departments. "They really did a great job," she said. And despite the scare, she said she feels safe in her home.
"I think this was a freak accident," she said. While the situation was certainly startling, particularly before the cause was determined, Ms. Nakhnikian said she doesn't feel like it was a near-death experience. "I really didn't feel like I just dodged a bullet, so to speak," she said. But, Ms. Nakhnikian said she believes the incident reveals a more systemic problem in American culture. "There's too many guns in this country," she said. "Because there are so many guns, the cops have to have guns."
And because police need to be trained with the weapons, she added, "There's really this big, huge problem in America of open firing ranges in populated areas." Recognizing that the likelihood of another bullet hitting her house is virtually nil, Ms. Nakhnikian said she hopes precautions are taken in communities across the country to ensure that practice ranges placed near neighborhoods are safe. As she says — and as her situation indicates — "the odds of anything happening are tiny, but they are not zero."
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