Uncle Faces Charges After 4-Year-Old Boy Shoots Aunt: Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office

Tampa Bay area authorities are looking for a man they say showed his 4-year-old nephew where a gun was being kept and then fled after the boy shot his aunt in the back.

The Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office said that 22-year-old Randall Simmons showed the .25 caliber semi-automatic handgun to the boy Monday while they were sitting in a 1998 Ford SUV parked outside a business at 9017 E. Adamo Drive in Tampa.

The boy retrieved the gun after Simmons got out and managed to shoot his aunt Shantell Wilson, 30, who was sitting in the front passenger seat, according to the sheriff's office. An 8-year-old child was also in the SUV.

Simmons returned to the vehicle with his cousin after hearing the gunshot but they then walked away with the children and fled the scene, the sheriff's office said.

The aunt was taken to Tampa General Hospital and released the next day.

Simmons faces a charge of felony culpable negligence and a warrant charge of being a felon in possession of a firearm, the sheriff's office said.

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