A young Etobicoke man who accidently shot a friend and narrowly missed killing her was sentenced Friday to 30 months imprisonment.

Tyler Cameron brandished an illegal handgun on March 8, 2016, in the basement of his Hinton Rd. home, said Justice Jane Kelly in sentencing him for criminal negligence causing bodily harm and possession of a loaded handgun.

Despite friends pleading with him to put away the deadly weapon, Cameron kept playing with it.

“A round discharged, striking Merna Jaro in the jaw, shattering it and dislodging several teeth,” said Kelly.

“The bullet that had been lodged in my throat was a hair strand away from taking my life,” stated Jaro, now 22, who underwent eight hours of emergency surgery as her family was warned she might not survive. “Thankfully, I did make it out of the surgery but it did come with a lot of baggage.”

She realizes the shooting was accidental.

“Just know that I do forgive you,” Jaro told Cameron in court.

Jaro has undergone subsequent surgeries and still suffers from flashbacks, court heard.

Cameron, 22, who pleaded guilty this summer, tried to evade justice initially. He and two friends “concocted a story about being approached, robbed and shot on John Garland Blvd. in Rexdale,” said Kelly.

This resulted in 20 police officers “using hundreds of ‘man hours’ canvassing and searching for the alleged perpetrator of the crime,” said Kelly. “At the time, they believed that they were searching for a ‘heinous and utterly dangerous individual.’”

Five days after the shooting, Cameron surrendered.

“This is a senseless act. The impact on the victim has been both physically and mentally devastating,” said Kelly.

Cameron’s mom and aunt say the incident is completely “out off character for him,” said Kelly. Friends and classmates at his adult learning class praised Cameron as “trustworthy, compassionate, charismatic and popular.”

Kelly said she doubts Cameron will be in trouble again.

The Grade 10 dropout — who had no prior criminal record — is studying to get his high school diploma and working at a vegetable farm.

“He’s extremely lucky he’s not facing a second-degree murder charge and the prospect of a life sentence,” said Cameron’s lawyer Howard Goldkind.

The judge subtracted six months from Cameron’s sentence because of his restrictive bail conditions, leaving him with two years less a day to serve.

spazzano@postmedia.com