Firearms Owners Against Crime
Institute for Legal, Legislative and Educational Action
Institute for Legal, Legislative and Educational Action
Dan Roberts has been fielding calls all morning from people concerned his daughter Shyanne was the 9-year-old New Jersey girl who killed a firearms instructor with a fully-automatic weapon at an Arizona shooting range Monday.
Shyanne — a highly trained competitive shooter who turns 10 on Thursday — was not the girl in the Arizona accident, Roberts said, but whoever the girl is, she should not be held at fault, he added.
"[The instructor] never should have been off to one side or the other. It's called the 180-degree rule," said Roberts, a weapons instructor from Franklin Township, Gloucester County.
"There's nothing inherently wrong with a 9-year-old shooting [fully automatic weapon]," Roberts said. "It just has to be done under very strictly controlled circumstances."
Charles Vacca, 39, of Lake Havasu City, Arizona, died Monday, a short time after being airlifted to a hospital in Las Vegas, authorities said.
Vacca was standing beside the girl, whose name was not released, at the Last Stop outdoor shooting range when she pulled the trigger of the Uzi. The recoil sent the gun over her head and a round hit the instructor.
The girl reportedly was at the White Hills range, called "Bullets and Burgers," with her parents.
Mohave County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman Trish Carter told the Las Vegas Review-Journal the family was vacationing from New Jersey, but there was no mention of their home town.
Carter did not immediately return the South Jersey Times request for additional details Tuesday morning.
9-year-old Shyanne Roberts, a nationally sponsored competitive shooter from Franklin Township, testified against the proposed limit on magazine
rounds at the statehouse on Monday, Thursday, Feb. 27, 2014. (Staff Photo by Joe Warner/South Jersey Times)
While Roberts said he didn't want to criticize the deceased instructor, he said there are a number of precautions instructors can take to prevent such an accident.
First, he said, the instructor should have been standing behind the girl, not to the side, as purportedly shown in a YouTube video of the moments right before the accident.
His hands also should have been physically overtop of hers, and if not, at least hovering right above.
"What that would've done, as soon as she started to lose control, he could've immediately directed that weapon in a safe direction," said Roberts.
He also said the automatic weapon, reported to be an Uzi, should not have been fully loaded with a 30-round magazine. Whenever he starts out a student on a platform they're new to handling, he starts out with one round, and then moves to two.
"You progress as you add rounds in increments," said Roberts, noting if the girl in the accident had only three rounds, the magazine would've been empty before any could reach the instructor. "Absolutely no way would I ever allow, 'Oh here's a 30-round magazine, have fun. Especially with a novice, you have no idea what they're capable of."