Teen Now Says He Accidentally Shot Himself

An all-out search for a shooting suspect in Camarillo ended early Thursday morning when the wounded victim told authorities that he had accidentally shot himself.

The injured 16-year-old boy has also been connected to 11 home burglaries that occurred in the area during February and March, said Sheriff’s Capt. Bill Montijo.

“He said he was twirling the gun around when it went off,” he said.

Two other boys, also from Camarillo, were arrested Thursday in connection with the burglaries and then returned to their parents’ custody, officials said. None of the suspects was identified because they are juveniles.

Investigators recovered stolen property from the wounded boy’s home and from a spot near where he was shot, Montijo said.

The boy was wounded Tuesday afternoon while walking along a dirt path next to a steep forested area between Mulberry Ridge and Willow View Drive when a handgun he was twirling fired once striking him in the upper chest, Montijo said.

The boy staggered up the hillside and collapsed on a lawn between two homes on Mulberry Ridge.

As residents came to his aid, he told them and authorities that he had been shot by a Latino man in his early 20s with a shaved head and a mustache.

When an all-out search of the area, which included five police dogs and a Sheriff’s Department helicopter, turned up nothing investigators decided to re-interview the boy.

“When we went back he changed his story,” Montijo said.

The boy told investigators that he threw the gun into the brush, but it has not been recovered.

The boy is still in the hospital recovering from the gunshot and has not been charged yet with a crime, Montijo said.