.45caliber

This file photo of a Glock .45 caliber pistol is similar to the Springfield handgun police retrieved at the scene. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)

(File, Julie Jacobson/AP)

BATTLE CREEK, MI -- A 24-year-old Battle Creek woman died after being shot by her boyfriend's handgun in their home on Valentine's Day, but investigators are still trying to determine how the shooting happened.

At 1:30 p.m. Feb. 14, the Battle Creek city police and medical crews were called to Kayla Babick's home on the first block of Highway Street, off Cliff Street in Battle Creek.

Det. Sgt. Troy Gilleylen of the Battle Creek Police Department said Babick and her 25-year-old boyfriend, whose name was not released, were in their upstairs bedroom at the time of the shooting, lying on their bed watching television. The boyfriend's .45-caliber handgun was on the bed, after it had just been cleaned and loaded.

Babick got up from the bed to answer the telephone, the boyfriend told police, and when she got back in bed, the gun discharged, sending a bullet through her left rib cage.

She staggered downstairs and collapsed in the living room, where she died.

The man told police she may have lain on top of the gun, or somehow hit it with her hand when she got back on the bed, causing it to discharge. Gilleylen said the distraught man has been "100 percent cooperative" with police and he has not been charged in the incident.

Two other adults and Babick's two young children, ages 2 and 4 years old, were in the house at the time of the incident. The other adults told police there were no sounds of fighting or arguments prior to the shooting, and neither Babick nor her boyfriend has a history of domestic violence, Gilleylen said. They have been a couple for a few months, he said.

Neither drugs nor alcohol are believed to have been factors in the shooting, Gilleylen said.

An autopsy was to be performed Monday. The investigation into the death, including more about the placement of the gun and how it fired, may take several months to complete, according to Gilleylen.

The man has a permit to carry the handgun, a Springfield, which was retrieved at the scene of the shooting.