COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – An 18-year-old man faces charges after he shot himself in the leg, then falsely told police he was shot in a downtown drive-by shooting instead.
Phillip Terry faces prohibited use of weapons and false reporting charges after the Thursday incident.
Terry had shown up to Penrose Hospital Thursday afternoon with a gunshot to his leg.
When police arrived to question him, as they customarily do with gunshot victims, he told officers he was walking downtown when a car drove by and shot him.
But police said that Terry’s injury and the probable trajectory the bullet would have traveled in the event of a drive-by shooting didn’t add up with his story.
They pressed him further, and he admitted that he had been “playing with” a handgun when it accidentally went off, hitting him in his leg.
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