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News brief: Close call when arthritic woman preps for target practice

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – A 70-year-old woman preparing to practice shooting with her husband and a friend was injured yesterday when she accidentally fired a pistol she thought was unloaded inside her Toledo-area home.

She suffers from arthritis and was unsure if she could still shoot due to limited use of her fingers, according to the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office.

Chief Deputy Stacy Brown said while the woman was walking from her bedroom to the front door, she pulled the trigger and either a fragment of the hollow-point bullet or a sharp piece of the magazine she was holding in her other hand caused a laceration to her left palm.

The gunshot mangled the pistol magazine, Brown said.

It happened at the 100 block of Kinzie Lane northeast of Toledo around 2 p.m. and a deputy met up with the woman in the emergency room at Providence Centralia Hospital, according to the sheriff’s office.

The sheriff’s office labeled the incident a negligent discharge of a weapon.

The woman was released from the hospital after her hand was cleaned and bandaged, Brown said. No stitches were required, Brown said.