PORTLAND, Ore. — After initially being charged with murder over the death of his girlfriend, Kimberly Venegas-Gonzalez, the charges against Leonel Macias-Silva of Portland have been reduced to manslaughter after he claimed the deadly shooting on August 10 was an accident.

Court documents indicate that a distraught man called 911 to report that his girlfriend was dead at 6:32 p.m. His mother also called 911, saying that her son’s girlfriend had accidentally shot herself and that her son had shot himself.

Arriving on the scene shortly thereafter, Portland Police Bureau officers found a man and woman outside the apartment, identified as Macias-Silva and his mother.

Macias’s mother said the victim had accidentally shot herself while playing with a gun, and Macias had told her that he did no

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