Police await lab results in teen shooting
To view our videos, you need to
enable JavaScript. Learn how.
install Adobe Flash 9 or above. Install now.
Then come back here and refresh the page.
FORT EDWARD, N.Y. -- More than two weeks after a 13-year-old lost his life, Fort Edward Police are awaiting lab results to find out exactly what happened the night Gary Cota was shot.
On the night of June 5th, Police said Cota and another 13-year-old boy were alone in an upstairs bedroom at Cota's family's Keating Avenue home when a shotgun the boys were handling went off.
Since then, Cota's autopsy has been completed and the results are being reviewed at the state police forensics lab in Albany. Police are also analyzing the shotgun and the DNA of both boys, trying to determine who was holding the gun and why it fired.
"We would rather have the thorough exams and make sure everything is done properly, so we're going to sit back and kind of wait for those results to come back in. At this point, it could take several weeks for those exams to be completed," said Sgt. Justin Derway, Fort Edward Police Department.
Cota was an eighth grader at Fort Edward Middle School.
Police are also still trying to determine where the ammunition for the shotgun came from.