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St. L Post-Dispatch St. Charles, Missouri A man accused of shooting his 12-day-old baby with a pellet gun is going to prison for four years for violating his probation.
In court testimony Monday, a sheriff's detective described the baby's shooting as "more like target practice" than an accident.
A judge Monday revoked probation for Shawn Michael Mohan, 20, on an earlier charge of child endangerment. Mohan had pleaded guilty and got a suspended four-year sentence and probation. That case involved a serious head injury that left Mohan's first son unresponsive when he was 3 months old. The child has fully recovered from those injuries, authorities said Monday.
St. Charles County Circuit Judge Nancy Schneider revoked Mohan's probation because of the incident with his baby in December and because of an arrest on a separate assault charge in November involving a disagreement over a broken window. Advertisement
Mohan is charged with felony child endangerment in the most recent incident. Police said Mohan shot the infant son several times while he was watching him in his apartment in an unincorporated part of St. Charles County near St. Peters. The shots caused circular shaped bruises to the baby's face, upper left arm, hand, foot, hip and buttocks.
The injuries, which were not serious, were found when the child went for a routine medical exam. Doctors notified authorities about the injuries.
St. Charles County Sheriff's Detective Mikki Straub testified Monday that Mohan told her the injuries to the baby were accidental. He and his brother had been playing with guns that fire plastic pellets, and when he went in the bedroom where the baby was sleeping, the gun fell and went off, he told her. He told her the gun had been rigged to fire five or six shots at a time.
But Straub said the baby's injuries didn't match with Mohan's account. The pellets had hit in the dead center of each area where the baby was injured.
Mohan's attorney, Paul Kaiser, disagreed and also took issue with characterization of the gun as a firearm. He said it was an air gun that fires plastic, not metal, pellets and compared it to a toy.
But Straub replied that it fires a projectile, and from a police perspective, it would be considered a threat if aimed at an officer, he said.
A preliminary hearing in the shooting is set for March 27.
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