San Bernardino Sheriff’s deputies walk under a crime scene tape in front of a home where a 2-year-old girl was shot and killed by her 4-year-old boy cousin in the 2700 block of Duffy Street in Muscoy on Friday, July 20, 2018. (Photo by Watchara Phomicinda, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)

Neighbors react outside their home after a 2-year-old girl was shot and killed by her 4-year-old boy cousin in the 2700 block of Duffy Street in Muscoy on Friday, July 20, 2018. (Photo by Watchara Phomicinda, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)

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San Bernardino County Sheriff’s investigators are on scene, in 2700 block of Duffy in Muscoy, where a 2-year-old girl was shot and killed by her 4-year-old male cousin, according to Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman Cindy Bachman on Friday, July 20, 2018. (Photo by Watchara Phomicinda, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)

San Bernardino County Sheriff’s detective walks toward a home in 2700 block of Duffy in Muscoy, where a 2-year-old girl was shot and killed by her 4-year-old male cousin, according to Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman Cindy Bachman on Friday, July 20, 2018. (Photo by Watchara Phomicinda, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)

San Bernardino County Sheriff’s investigators are on scene outside a home in 2700 block of Duffy in Muscoy, where a 2-year-old girl was shot and killed by her 4-year-old male cousin, according to Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman Cindy Bachman on Friday, July 20, 2018. (Photo by Watchara Phomicinda, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)



San Bernardino County Sheriff’s investigators are on scene in 2700 block of Duffy in Muscoy where a 2-year-old girl was shot and killed by her 4-year-old male cousin, according to Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman Cindy Bachman on Friday, July 20, 2018. (Photo by Watchara Phomicinda, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)

San Bernardino Sheriff’s investigators work the scene in front of a home where a 2-year-old girl was shot and killed by her 4-year-old boy cousin in the 2700 block of Duffy Street in Muscoy on Friday, July 20, 2018. (Photo by Watchara Phomicinda, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)

A grandfather of a slain 2-year-old girl was arrested Friday, July 20, after a 4-year-old boy who discovered a gun in their Muscoy home accidentally shot his cousin to death, the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department said.

Cesar Lopez, 53, left the weapon in an area that was accessible to the children, the Sheriff’s Department said. The boy found the gun and fired a single shot, striking the girl.

Lopez was arrested on suspicion of child endangerment and being a felon in possession of a firearm.

Muscoy is a community of about 10,000 people located just west of the 215 Freeway and north of Highway 210, northwest of San Bernardino. The area near the house is rural. Many of the homes are on large lots with dirt front yards and sidewalks. The home where the child was shot is across the street from a Mexican restaurant and near the Baker Family Learning Center.

The shooting happened about 9:15 a.m. in the 2700 block of Duffy Street. The girl died about an hour after being hospitalized, sheriff’s spokeswoman Cindy Bachman said. Both children lived at the house.

The adults in the house at the time of the shooting were taken to Sheriff’s Department headquarters for questioning, Bachman said. All of them cooperated.

‘So sad’

Columbus McBath, a 72-year-old neighbor, said he heard someone from the house yell about calling 911. McBath said he has known the family for about 30 years, calling them “cool people, nice people.”

He called the news “devastating.”

McBath, a truck driver, lives with his wife, sister-in-law and three young grandchildren, from 4 months to 9 years old.

“People who got guns have to lock them up so kids can’t get them,” he said.

Another neighbor, Danitra Lewis, 56, lives with two grandchildren — a 9-year-old and a 15-year-old — and said she could not understand how a boy as young as 4 could be left alone long enough to find a gun.

“This is negligence here,” Lewis said. “I know these people are hurting, but a 4-year-old shouldn’t know where a gun is kept, let alone have access to it.”

She added: “It’s unfortunate. So sad.”

Shootings, charges not unusual

Shooting deaths of children so young are not common – but they are not unheard of.

In 2015, the most recent year for which data are available, there were 78 deaths by firearms of children ages 1 to 4 among the 36,252 firearms-related deaths in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

From 1999 to 2016, according to the agency, 294 2-year-olds died from gunshot wounds.

Children up to 12 years old who died from gunshot wounds were 10 times more likely than children ages 13 to17 to die from accidental or undetermined intent shootings, according to a study in the journal Pediatrics.

Many times, when a child picks up an unsecured gun and shoots another, the parents are charged.

In 2017, a 3-year-old in Alabama died from a gunshot wound while playing cops and robbers with another child. The parents were charged after investigators learned that the children had been left alone at home and a gun was left unsecured.

Also in 2017, the father of a 4-year-old Tennessee boy who fatally shot himself in the head was charged, as were the parents of a 4-year-old in Las Vegas who died after accidentally shooting himself.

And in March, the parents of a 9-year-old Milwaukee girl were charged after being shot by her 10-year-old brother. Officers found a gun lock, unused, in the house, the Journal Sentinel reported.

But no charges were filed against the parents of an 11-month-old boy shot to death by his 2-year-old brother in Alabama.

In Muscoy, where this morning a 2-year-old girl was shot and killed by her 4-year-old male cousin, according to Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman Cindy Bachman. Bachman said there were adults in the house at the time, though it is unclear how the toddler got the gun. @sbsun pic.twitter.com/FOcKWPJFSe — Brian Whitehead (@bwhitehead3) July 20, 2018

Staff writer Nathaniel Percy contributed to this report.