The Ankeny Police Department in Iowa released the name of the child who died in a gunshot incident this week.
On Monday, a 4-year-old girl died of injuries from a gunshot wound after an incident in the 900 block of Northeast Fifth Street. Police identified the girl as Savannah Holmes in a Wednesday news release.
According to court documents filed on Wednesday, officers arrived at the home with a report that the girl shot herself in the face with a handgun.
First responders began treating the girl at the scene and she later died of her injuries at a local hospital.
The incident was isolated and there is no danger to the public, police said.
The court documents filed on Wednesday police said the girl’s father told police that he put his two children, his daughter, Savannah, and his son, in their high chairs to feed them after returning home from dropping off a bag at his wife’s workplace.
He said that he saw two men approach the front door and heard them pounding on it. The father feared a confrontation with the men, so he grabbed his pistol and went to the front door, he told police.
According to the warrant, the father told police he put the gun down near a couch and spoke to the men, one of whom said he had left his phone in the home.
The father told police that his children had gotten out of their high chairs, and he went back inside to grab his son, who was climbing up the stairs. That’s when he believes that his daughter grabbed the gun and shot herself, he told police.
The two men who were there to retrieve the phone told police they were speaking with the father on the front lawn. One of them saw the boy crawl up the stairs and the father grab him. But they said the father came back out and that they were all outside when they heard the gunshot.
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