Michael Eugene Johnson contends that accidental shootings involving children are preventable acts of adult negligence and should be treated as criminal offenses. He calls for stronger accountability and legal consequences to ensure firearms are properly secured and children are protected. (Photo Credit: Unsplash / David Trinks)
Michael Eugene Johnson is creator of the Pikes Studio Cinema and cofounder of Black Men Unifying Black Men. This week, he speaks to the idea of gun safety versus the reality. (Photo Credit: Meta (Facebook)/ Michael Eugene Johnson)
by Michael Eugene Johnson
There are some headlines that should never feel routine. Yet across this country—from Baltimore to Chicago to Atlanta—we continue to read the same devastating words: Child injured in accidental shooting.
We call them accidents. But too often, they are acts of adult negligence. When a child gets hold of a firearm inside a home, that child did not fail. The adult did. Children do not purchase guns. They do not decide how weapons are stored. They do not control whether a firearm is locked in a safe or left loaded in a drawer. Adults make those decisions. Adults bear that responsibility. Yet each time tragedy strikes, the conversation drifts. We talk about curiosity. We talk about peer pressure. We talk about bad luck. Rarely do we focus squarely on the one factor that could have prevented the harm: a properly secured weapon.
This is not a debate about whether someone has the legal right to own a firearm. Rights come with responsibilities. Owning a gun in a household with children demands heightened caution—not casual storage. A loaded firearm under a pillow or inside an unlocked nightstand is not responsible ownership. It is a disaster waiting to happen.
If a child injures themselves because an adult failed to secure a gun, that should not be treated as a mere mistake. It should be prosecuted as criminal negligence. If that same firearm was illegal—unregistered, unlawfully obtained, or prohibited in that household—the penalties should be even more severe. An illegal gun combined with a child’s access is not a technical violation; it is reckless endangerment.
