Disturbing drone footage shows New Mexico sheriff’s deputies disarming two boys, ages 7 and 9, armed with a loaded handgun during a tense standoff earlier this year.
The video, taken back in February but released last week, shows the boys passing the firearm back and forth and even appearing to fight over it as deputies with the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office try to negotiate with them from behind a nearby wall.
“Yes, this is a real firearm,” Sheriff John Allen said at a press conference Thursday while showing the video and discussing some of the deescalation tactics used. “Our deputies could have taken deadly force. That would not have gone well with anybody in the nation.”
The children had been taught how to use the weapon and were known to the deputies, who had been called to their home over 50 times due to “problems and family issues,” Allen said.
“It’s not unknown for these deputies to arrive there and deal with something dramatic or traumatic,” he said.
It wasn’t until deputies fired nonlethal rounds at the boys, backing them into a corner, that authorities ran in, disarmed them and placed them in handcuffs, as the video shows.
Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office
Allen credited his office’s drone program for preventing deputies’ use of deadly force, as the aircraft was able to provide them with real-time updates on the gun and the children’s location throughout the ordeal.
No charges have been filed in the case, “due to it being tied to an on-going investigation,” Sheriff’s Public Information Officer Deanna L. Aragon told HuffPost on Monday, adding that children this young are unable to be charged in the state.
Allen said authorities are looking into potential charges against the children’s parents, however, using a state law that makes it a crime to store firearms within children’s reach. For now, he said they’re focusing on helping the family with the county’s Department of Behavioral Health Services.
Aragon confirmed Monday that the boys, who she said obtained the firearm from within their home, remain with their guardians. State law prohibits authorities from arresting the children and removing them from their parents’ custody, according to the Albuquerque Journal.
“We know one side is going to say, ‘Lock them in jail.’ They’re 7 and 9 years old. I told you before, numerous times in numerous interviews, that I understand the frontal lobe,” Allen told reporters, referring to the part of the brain that children are still developing and that is crucial to decision-making.
