Woman shot in the leg at Pennsylvania gun show
A woman was shot in the leg Saturday at a gun show in central Pennsylvania, police say, after a gun accidentally went off during a vendor's demonstration.
The incident took place at the Eagle Arms Gun Show at the Bloomsburg Fairgrounds, The Associated Press reports. Vendor Geoffrey Hawk, 44, was running a booth for his company, In Case of Emergency Enterprises. Hawk told police he believed the gun was unloaded when he showed a 25-year-old woman how to use a concealed-carry wallet holster. The woman was hit and treated for a wound to her thigh, and has since been released from a local hospital.
Hawk told police he had gone through 20 different demonstrations before the shooting without incident, and thought that perhaps when he went to conduct background checks someone could have come up to the unattended gun on display and loaded it.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The show's organizer, Joel Koehler, said that his staff checks all guns to make sure they are not loaded before they can enter. There was a large sign on display that said "No Loaded Weapons," and Koehler said it was the first time a shooting had happened at one of his shows.
The Columbia County district attorney's office will soon decide whether or not Hawk will face charges in relation to the shooting.
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
-
Political cartoons for January 4Cartoons Sunday's political cartoons include a resolution to learn a new language, and new names in Hades and on battleships
-
The ultimate films of 2025 by genreThe Week Recommends From comedies to thrillers, documentaries to animations, 2025 featured some unforgettable film moments
-
Political cartoons for January 3Cartoons Saturday's political cartoons include citizen journalists, self-reflective AI, and Donald Trump's transparency
-
Son arrested over killing of Rob and Michele ReinerSpeed Read Nick, the 32-year-old son of Hollywood director Rob Reiner, has been booked for the murder of his parents
-
Rob Reiner, wife dead in ‘apparent homicide’speed read The Reiners, found in their Los Angeles home, ‘had injuries consistent with being stabbed’
-
Hungary’s Krasznahorkai wins Nobel for literatureSpeed Read László Krasznahorkai is the author of acclaimed novels like ‘The Melancholy of Resistance’ and ‘Satantango’
-
Primatologist Jane Goodall dies at 91Speed Read She rose to fame following her groundbreaking field research with chimpanzees
-
Florida erases rainbow crosswalk at Pulse nightclubSpeed Read The colorful crosswalk was outside the former LGBTQ nightclub where 49 people were killed in a 2016 shooting
-
Trump says Smithsonian too focused on slavery's illsSpeed Read The president would prefer the museum to highlight 'success,' 'brightness' and 'the future'
-
Trump to host Kennedy Honors for Kiss, StalloneSpeed Read Actor Sylvester Stallone and the glam-rock band Kiss were among those named as this year's inductees
-
White House seeks to bend Smithsonian to Trump's viewSpeed Read The Smithsonian Institution's 21 museums are under review to ensure their content aligns with the president's interpretation of American history
