A Chicago father who chose guns over sons is facing felony charges today, after one of his boys fatally shot the other while playing Cops and Robbers with dad’s loaded firearm.
Michael Santiago told detectives investigating the death of his three-year-old at the hands of his six-year-old this weekend that he was a former gang member and “a snitch” who felt it necessary to have a pistol “for protection.”
Unfortunately he stored the unlicensed Smith&Wesson fully loaded and atop the refrigerator, where Santiago’s older son managed to grab it on Saturday night.
The revolver went off as the two children were playing with it, striking the younger brother square in the face and killing him instantly, according to medical reports.
Prosecutors told a judge Sunday that ex ‘Spanish Cobras’ gangster Michael Santiago not only foolishly kept the street-bought weapon unsecured in his home, but “a week prior to the shooting he showed his older son where he kept the gun.”
The child is apparently still too young to even comprehend the crime he unwittingly committed this weekend: Family members stated he thinks his dead little brother is simply in the hospital “sick.”
Authorities have charged the boy’s father with felony endangerment of a minor in the fatal shooting of his toddler brother. If convicted for that wrongful death, the 25-year-old man is facing up to 10 years in prison.
