A Michigan man has been charged with illegally possessing the handgun that a 2-year-old used to fatally shoot himself in a car, as well as with the subsequent burning of the vehicle, federal prosecutors said Wednesday.
A grand jury returned an indictment against Avis Damone Coward for counts of being a felon in possession of a firearm, conspiracy to tamper with evidence and tampering with evidence, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Michigan said.
The child shot himself while the vehicle he was in was parked at a Lansing gas station on Oct. 24, the prosecutor’s office said.
Coward handed off the child to someone else who took the boy to the gas station, the U.S. attorney's office said in a statement. Then, he picked up his gun, used his fist to break the window where the bullet had exited and drove away, the office said.
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The sport-utility vehicle was later found torched in a field. Coward pleaded not guilty to all three counts Wednesday, his lawyer, Heath Lynch, said.
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