“THE investigation is moving forward,” Department of Public Safety Commissioner Clement Bermudes said, referring to an accidental discharge of a gun that injured a seven-year-old boy on May 21, 2023.
“We are in communication with the Attorney General’s Office too, and that’s the collaboration that we need to maintain, because part of the criminal investigation process is to keep the prosecutor informed of our progress,” Bermudes told reporters.
According to the DPS chief, the Guam Police Department is conducting ballistic analysis.
“GPD has the crime lab — we don’t have capability here,” he added.
But GPD personnel are also recovering from the damage of Typhoon Mawar, Bermudes said.
“They [GPD] have their own list of priorities, but once finalized, the results of the examination will be released. A lot of people think that they can do an analysis on paper, but we can’t. We want to make sure that we are careful. Let science review the actual weapon that was used, and who owns the weapon,” he added.
Asked whether it’s “complicated” to distinguish a firearm from a service firearm, or to determine whether the firearm was discharged in what room, Bermudes said, “We know that there were adults, and it’s a residence, there’s a private room, there are weapons in the home — those are the facts.”
He added, “We cannot just manually look at the weapon and say which one shot the bullet that eventually injured the child. What it looks like [is that] a gun/firearm was not properly stored, and the child was injured in the process. The law is very clear for gun owners when not using their weapon. You clear the weapon, meaning no bullets in the chamber. For pistols you remove the magazine and lock it away. Accidental firing is exactly what we are trying to prevent,” Bermudes said.
“That’s part of gun ownership. Please clear the weapon and lock it away, because kids are curious and, out of curiosity, they will touch your weapon and figure what it is,” he added.
Bermudes confirmed that a law enforcement officer was among the individuals present at the house where the accidental shooting happened.
Asked whether the law enforcement officer did not secure his service firearm, Bermudes said, “That’s part of the investigation. The challenging part is that there was a gun with the same caliber in the house…so that’s why we can’t just outrightly say whose weapon was fired….”
As to whether other guns in the house had been fired recently, the DPS chief said, “Without ballistics we cannot state that it was X weapon and not Y weapon…. But it’s the same caliber. Without any other weapon [in the house]…it would be clear that it’s a service weapon, right? But if there’s another similar caliber in the house, and individuals here go to gun ranges; if they don’t clean the weapon, it will have residue from the last time they went to a firing range. Again, we don’t want to speculate or jump to a conclusion. We want the evidence and the facts [and] if there’s violation of the law, then the AG’s office can prosecute.”
A community member who requested anonymity stated: “It baffles me that the investigation is taking so long because even if there are multiple guns in the home, if the one used in the shooting was registered, police could immediately tell whose gun it was as every gun has its own serial number right?”
“Why did we need to have Guam analyze our own evidence if it could easily be told here from our own records,” the individual added.
