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The last moments of a gun instructor killed by a 9-year-old

“All right! Full auto!”

Those were the last words of a gun instructor shot dead by a 9-year-old New Jersey girl firing an Uzi at an Arizona shooting range, according to a video taken by the girl’s own parents.

The unidentified youngster — in hot pink shorts, her dark hair tied back in a ponytail — then takes aim at a black-silhouette target in the distance at the Bullets and Burgers outdoor range.

But as soon as she opens fire with the fully automatic weapon, the recoil forces it upwards and to her left, pointing directly at her instructor, Charles Vacca, 39, of Lake Havasu, who was shot in the head.

In the seconds leading up to the fatal accident, Vacca can be seen coaching the girl into a basic shooter’s stance, and cheering her on when she fires a single shot that appears to strike the target.

“We have to keep that held in, otherwise the gun won’t fire, OK? Turn this leg forward, there you go, just like that. All right, go ahead and give me one shot,” Vacca says, standing beside the girl and crouching toward her.

The video, released by investigators, stops just short of when Vacca was killed. The girl was not injured.

The death happened Monday at the range, located at the Last Stop campgrounds in White Hills, about 50 miles southeast of Las Vegas.

“Shoot a machine gun in Las Vegas!” the range’s Web site — since shut down — announced.

I have regret we let this child shoot, and I have regret that Charlie was killed in the incident.

 - Sam Scarmardo, gun range operator

It touched off a furious debate about whether children that young should be allowed to handle weapons like the powerful, Israeli-made Uzi.

“You can’t give a 9-year-old an Uzi and expect her to control it,” said Ronald Scott, a Phoenix-based firearms safety expert.

He said most shooting ranges have an age limit and strict safety rules about how to teach kids to shoot.

But range operator Sam Scarmardo said Wednesday the girl’s parents had signed waivers saying they understood the range’s rules, and that allowing kids 8 and older to shoot with an instructor watching is standard practice in the industry.

“I have regret we let this child shoot, and I have regret that Charlie was killed in the incident,” Scarmardo said.

A Mohave County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman told the Las Vegas Review-Journal the family was vacationing from New Jersey, but did not identify them or their hometown.

It wasn’t the first accidental shooting by a child using an Uzi. An 8-year-old Connecticut boy died after shooting himself in the head at a gun expo in Massachusetts in 2008.