By Joe Anuta
An 8-year-old boy brought a loaded handgun into a Flushing school Thursday and sold it to a fellow third-grader for $3.50, authorities said.
The deal was discovered at around 3 p.m. after the second boy brought his purchase home to show his mother. Police said she immediately took the pistol, which contained three rounds of ammunition, and returned to PS 107, at 167-02 45th Ave.
An official at the school then called police.
“The whole idea of a second- or third-grader carrying a loaded firearm into a crowded school and selling it is very disturbing on so many levels,” Queens DA Richard Brown said in a statement.
The gun was a 9mm Taurus semi-automatic pistol and had its serial number filed off, likely to make tracing its origins more difficult.
It belonged to the first boy’s father, 54-year-old Ignacio Galvan, the DA said.
Galvan told police that he kept the loaded weapon on a shelf in his house and was not aware it was missing, the DA said.
“Children cannot fully appreciate the potential harm a weapon can inflict and, as a parent, the defendant had a responsibility to properly secure the firearm — whether legal or illegal — in order to protect his son and others,” Brown said.
Galvan was charged with endangering the welfare of a child and criminal possession of a weapon.
And Galvan’s son, who allegedly sold the gun, was also charged with criminal possession of a weapon.
The boy who bought the gun was not charged.
City Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott said, “It’s really a sad situation when you have an 8-year-old who brought a gun into school and then sold it for $3. That’s something that can’t be tolerated.”
Reach reporter Joe Anuta by e-mail at januta@cnglocal.com or by phone at 917-600-6286.
