Police question whether woman was shot in the face by accident

Police question whether woman was shot in the face by accident

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OGDEN — Ogden police are investigating whether a woman who was shot in the face was injured during a drunken accident as originally claimed or if criminal charges are warranted.

The woman was shot in the face Oct. 1 by her boyfriend inside a home in Ogden, according to police. Her injuries were not life-threatening.

When police arrived and talked to the boyfriend, he “repeatedly made the spontaneous utterance that the incident had been an accident. As he was speaking with officers, they observed the strong odor of an alcoholic beverage on his person, slightly slurred speech, and was repeating the same phrases over and over,” according to a search warrant affidavit filed in 2nd District Court.

The girlfriend told police that she had been in an argument with her roommate earlier in the evening.

“After that was over, she and (her boyfriend) had gone back to the basement of the residence and for some reason unbeknownst to her, (he) had a gun with him. She stated that they were both downstairs, and that (he) cocked the gun and then it went off, striking her in the face,” the warrant states.

When asked why the gun was cocked, the woman said her boyfriend “had been trying to place the gun back in his gun safe, but that it had gone off and shot her instead. When asked why the gun had been pointed at her during this, she stated she didn’t know,” according to the affidavit.

Investigators also questioned why the gun was being cocked in one room of the basement “when the safe was in a completely different room,” police wrote in the warrant. “She was also not able to give an answer. She repeatedly insisted that the shooting had been an accident.”

A black Walther P-22 handgun along with two magazines containing a total of 16 rounds were seized during the search.

Two weeks after the shooting, the woman filed for a protective order against her boyfriend, according to court records.

As of Wednesday, no arrests had been made and no charges have been filed in the case.

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Pat Reavy is a longtime police and courts reporter. He joined the KSL.com team in 2021, after many years of reporting at the Deseret News and KSL NewsRadio before that.

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