A rookie Hong Kong cop was shot in the thigh on Tuesday, when his revolver misfired during a police training session.
The accident happened at the Hong Kong Police College in Aberdeen, according to hk.on.cc. The 23-year-old recruit joined the force just four months ago, and was a little more than halfway into his 27-week training.
A police spokesperson confirmed to Coconuts HK that a cadet’s gun went off when he was putting it back into his holster, and that he was sent, conscious, to the hospital for treatment.
“One bullet fired,” she said. “There was a wound on his right leg.”
She was unable to say whether similar incidents have happened in the past, though they’re certainly not unheard of.
Last July, an auxiliary police sergeant accidentally fired a gun in the Tuen Mun police station. It was the second accidental discharge by a police officer in a month. There were at least four other similar incidents in a four-month span the year before.
Police are looking into whether the cadet accidentally pulled the trigger on Tuesday, or the gun misfired for other reasons, SCMP reported. A source told the newspaper that the police will also be investigating how closely the constable — an early stage Hong Kong police title — followed safety procedures.
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