Affidavit: Brain Surgery Required Because Dad Shot Son in Head with BB Gun

SAN ANGELO, TX – A man has was arrested Wednesday for shooting his son in the head with a BB gun causing serious injury.

On March 16, the San Angelo Emergency Medical Service received a call from a father saying that his child had been shot in the head with a .117 caliber BB airgun and needed help.

The child was taken to Shannon Medical Center and stabilized, then soon thereafter airlifted to Dell Children's Hospital in Austin. Police met with the father, Isaac Lopez, at Shannon and asked about what happened that day. Lopez told them that he had allowed his 3-year-old son play with a BB gun in the living room while he was in a different room in the house. He said that before he gave the son the gun he checked to see if it was unloaded. It was, he told police. Yet, he said, he had left loose BB's lying on the dining room table within reach of the 3-year-old.

When he returned to the room, his child asked him to play a game like they always did. According to the affidavit, Lopez stated he frequently plays with his son using the airgun to blow air at his son's face. 

Police said that Lopez grabbed the gun, pumped it five times, pointed it at the child's head, and then shot him in the head. But this time, the gun was loaded. Once the father realized what had happened, he immediately administered first aid and called 9-1-1.

Once in Austin, the child underwent surgery to remove the steel BB that was lodged in the child's brain. The surgery left him hospitalized until April 16, about a month after the incident. The father said that he had checked to see if the chamber was empty every time until this incident. He assumed the child loaded the weapon while he wasn't watching because he was in the other room.

Lopez was arrested and charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon to a family member and is currently in the Tom Green County Jail on a $45,000 bond.