Gun brought to school brings charges

NEW YORK, May 1 (UPI) -- An 8-year-old boy from Queens, N.Y., who took his father's loaded pistol to school and sold it to a classmate faces charges with his dad, police say.

The child allegedly took the illegal 9mm, loaded with three rounds, from "on top of the refrigerator" in the Flushing home he shares with his father, Ignacio Galvan, 54, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said.

"The 8-year-old boy has been arrested. … Here you have a young boy who sees a gun in his house, and sells it," Kelly said. "It just underscored the scourge of guns that we see."

The third-grade child took the unlicensed gun with the serial number scratched out to PS107 Thursday where he sold it to another boy in his grade for $3.50. The boy who bought the gun allegedly thought he was buying a toy, the New York Post reported Saturday.

When the young purchaser went home he told his mother about the incident.

"'Mom, I think it's real.' He pulled it out and hands it to me. Oh, my God! I could see it's a 9mm. I was flipping out," the mother, who didn't want her name released, said.

Her son was suspended from school, the Post said.

Galvan was arrested and faces charges of weapons possession, reckless endangerment and child endangerment.