Trial nears for Weiser man charged in boy’s death

By: 
by Steve Lyon
The defense attorney for a local man charged in connection to the accidental shooting death of a 6-year-old boy in 2016 has asked that the case be dismissed.
 District Court Judge Susan Wiebe said she planned to rule on the defense’s motion to dismiss this week. If the motion is denied, a jury trial scheduled for April 9 will proceed against Charles Dinegar.
 The tragic incident that led to the charge of felony injury to a child against Dinegar happened on Aug. 6, 2016, at a home south of Weiser.
 A 6-year-old boy visiting Dinegar’s home on Macomb Road with his parents found his handgun on a shelf. The boy accidently fired the weapon and died from a single bullet wound.
 Two years later, in August of 2018, a grand jury made up of Washington County residents handed down an indictment against Dinegar, charging him with a crime for allowing a loaded gun to be within reach of the child. 
Dinegar, 62, pleaded not guilty to the charge in September of 2018 and the case has been continued for various reasons since the indictment. 
 According to the deceased child’s grandmother, the court hearing last Thursday was the 10th she has attended as the case slowly moves through the district court. 
 Some of the delay can be attributed to a new defense attorney taking the case and getting up to speed on the many court filings. The case was scheduled to go to trial last December and then again in February, but those dates were vacated.
 The prosecutor and the defense do not dispute that the child’s death was an accident and self-inflicted. 
 The issue, and the basis for the felony charge, is if Dinegar has culpability for leaving the loaded handgun where he did.
 Dinegar’s attorney, Matt Roker, argued in the motion to dismiss the case that the evidence presented to the grand jury does not support a finding of probable cause that a crime was committed by Dinegar. 
 The child was not in Dinegar’s care or custody at the time of the shooting. There is an “intentional” element in charging someone with felony injury to a child based on Idaho Supreme Court decisions, Roker said.
 The evidence presented to the grand jury in the case doesn’t support the charge, he said, laying out his arguments for the judge.
 Prosecuting attorney Delton Walker filed a motion of opposition to dismissing the charge against Dinegar. 
 He said the judge could read the state’s arguments in support of the charge in the court filings.
 He said that as a general summary, the state presented ample evidence to the grand jury that supported the felony charge.
 

 

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