Woman pointing gun’s laser sight for cat to chase shoots man, Wisconsin cops say

A woman is accused of shooting one of her friends Tuesday while using a gun’s laser sight as a toy, Wisconsin cops say.

Officers in Kenosha responded to an apartment Tuesday afternoon for reports of a man shot. When they arrived, they found a man had been shot in the thigh, according to a criminal complain.

Jashanti Pleasant, 19, had drunk several shots of brandy while at the apartment before picking up a gun brought by James Daniels, investigators determined

“Pleasant turned on the laser sight and was pointing it at the floor to get a cat to chase it,” police wrote in the probable cause affidavit.

As Pleasant was pointing the 9mm gun between the floor and Daniels’ legs, Daniels told the woman, “Hey, let me get that.” The gun then went off, and a witness told police that Daniels stood in shock for a moment before asking Pleasant if she just shot him.

Officers found Daniels in a neighboring apartment and applied a tourniquet to his upper leg to stop the bleeding. He told officers he had removed the magazine from the handgun before the incident took place, according to police.

Pleasant said Daniels had allowed her to “play” with the gun and she also thought it wasn’t loaded at the time, police said. But an officer who recovered the gun found it had one bullet in the chamber and six in the magazine.

“If the magazine had not been inserted into the gun when Ms. Pleasant fired the shot, there would have been no round in the chamber later when the gun was found,” police said. “(The officer) determined that the bullet went through Mr. Daniels’ leg and then through a wall into the kitchen, where it hit the back of the stove.”

Pleasant called the shooting an accident and she apologized to Daniels, who she said forgave her, according to the complaint. She was charged with injury by negligent handling of a dangerous weapon.

Daniels was out on bond on nine counts of recklessly endangering safety while armed and was not allowed to possess any weapons, police said. He now faces additional charges, the Kenosha News reported.

This story was originally published August 13, 2021 at 1:05 PM with the headline "Woman pointing gun’s laser sight for cat to chase shoots man, Wisconsin cops say."