By Fred Stabbert III
GRAHAMSVILLE – An accidental discharge of a handgun in the Neversink Town Hall on Monday afternoon resulted in the resignation of two town employees.
Code Enforcement Officer Dave Sparling, to whom the gun was registered, apparently was showing Deputy Town Clerk Sue Kitson his handgun at approximately 1:30 p.m. when she pulled the trigger and the gun discharged, officials said.
“It’s absolutely incredible,” Town of Neversink Supervisor Greg Goldstein, who was not in the office at the time, said. “Thank God no one was hurt.”
According to Goldstein the bullet hit a chair, ricocheted through the floor and wound up in the basement of the corner office space facing Route 55 in the hamlet of Grahamsville.
“It could have been a disaster,” Goldstein said.
It is unknown what calibre or make the registered handgun was.
According to family members, Kitson is believed to also have a New York State pistol permit.
Reached by phone yesterday at the Sparling home in Glen Spey, a person read a prepared statement about the incident which simply stated that the gun had been accidentally discharged and both parties involved had resigned.
A special Town of Neversink town board meeting Wednesday night appointed retired Code Enforcement Officer John Perrella to the part-time post, Goldstein said.