A Georgia father has been charged with child cruelty after he didn’t get help when his four-year-old son shot himself.
Shawn Darin Smith, 26, was booked on Halloween at the DeKalb County Jail and charged with cruelty to children – deprivation of necessary sustenance.
Smith’s four-year-old, who has not been named, took a bullet in an apartment on Bouldercrest Road back in February.
He told a social worker he’d shot himself while playing with a gun but his uncle, who took him to the hospital, claimed it was a drive-by shooting and that the child was known for making up stories, according to a police report.
Shawn Darin Smith, 26 (pictured), of Dekalb County, Georgia, has been charged with cruelty to children after police say he didn’t get help when his four-year-old son accidentally shot himself in February
The child’s condition is unknown, but he survived and was treated at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta’s at Hughes Spalding Hospital.
His uncle, Jeffrey Johnson II, claimed he was babysitting the boy when the shooting occurred, and court records indicate the Bouldcrest Road apartment is Johnson’s permanent address.
Johnson was arrested on February 19, although a police report from that date makes no mention of Smith
Both Smith and Johnson are being held at the Dekalb County Jail. Johnson was charged with cruelty to children, false report of a crime, armed robbery, and reckless conduct.
This is not Smith’s first run-in with the law. He was arrested in May 2013 in Broward County, Florida.
Arrest records show he was charged with probation violation or community control; use, display, etc of a firearm during a felony; possession of a weapon or ammunition by a convicted Florida felon; and home invasion with a firearm or other deadly weapon.
Bond at the time was set at $12,500.