“We are deeply saddened at the loss of one of our officer’s family members,” Police Chief Cory Christensen said in a statement. “We will continue to support the officer and his family through this difficult time.”

Christensen continued: “The loss of any life is tragic. The loss of a son or daughter to a horrible accident is something no parent should have to endure.”

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Gavin Michael Stiles, who turned 3 on May 8, died in the shooting, according to the Routt County Sheriff’s Office.

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The sheriff’s office, which is conducting a “death investigation” with the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, identified the boy’s father as Michael Richard Stiles and his mother as Joni Stiles.

Authorities have not provided details of the circumstances surrounding the incident, including who owned the gun, whether the gun was issued by the police department and whether the boy was alone at the time of the shooting.

After the shooting, Michael Richard Stiles and a friend drove the 3-year-old toward Steamboat Springs and were met by paramedics en route who took the child to the hospital, Steamboat Today reported.

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The shooting took place in Oak Creek.

“This is a tragic loss and our thoughts and prayer are with the family and the community,” Routt County Undersheriff Ray Birch said in a statement.

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“It’s very emotional,” Birch told Steamboat Today. “We’re like a family. We’re very close.”

Across the country so far this year, there have been at least 137 other child shootings — in which minors unintentionally shoot themselves or others — according to Everytown for Gun Safety, a group funded by former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg. That data, compiled by combing news reports, includes shootings that result in injury or death.

In 2015, there were at least 278 such shootings, more than half of which involved unsafe storage of guns, according to the advocacy organization.

At least four other children in Colorado have been involved in unintentional shootings this year, two of them fatal.

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In January, a 9-year-old boy in southern Colorado died after his younger brother shot him in the head. The children were inside a parked vehicle when they found the handgun the younger boy used, according to investigators.

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Last month, Anthony Jaliel Lujan Hemmings, 10, died of a gunshot wound in Aurora, Colo. Family members said they believed the boy found the gun wrapped in cloth on top of a shelf and that he died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, the Denver Post reported.

Aurora Police later arrested the boy’s 17-year-old brother and charged him as a juvenile with felony negligent child abuse resulting in death.

[This story has been updated.]

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