Police: Teen Accidentally Shoots Himself in Leg

In an incident likely to remind some of NFL wide receiver Plaxico Burress, a 19-year-old Bethlehem man accidentally shot himself in the leg when the handgun he was carrying fell out of the waistband of his pants on Thursday, Bethlehem police said.

When he tried to catch it he inadvertently pulled the trigger and injured himself, said police who did not identify the shooter/victim.

Bethlehem Police Det. David Bartera told The Express-Times that the young man initially reported that he had been the victim of a robbery on Stefko Boulevard, but the facts didn’t add up.

"He finally 'fessed up to say that he had shot himself,” Bartera told the newspaper.

Police responded to the emergency room at in Fountain Hill after receiving a report about a gunshot victim.

It is unclear at this point where the accident happened or whether the shooter had a license to carry a weapon. The incident remains under investigation.

In November 2008, while he played for the New York Giants, Burress accidentally shot himself in the thigh with a handgun. He reportedly was at a New York nightclub when the weapon slipped out of his waistband and his efforts to retrieve it resulted in him shooting himself.

He ultimately pleaded guilty to criminal possession of a weapon and reckless endangerment and spent two years in prison.