A coroner has called for a review of firearms offences following his investigation into the accidental death of a Nayook teenager almost eight years ago.

Handing down his finding into the death of Dustin Buckley, state coroner Judge John Cain has called for amendments to criminal and firearms legislation to create an offence "prohibiting the pointing of a firearm at another person's face or head."
Calling on Attorney-General Sonya Kilkenny to consider his three recommendations, Judge Cain also recommended making it a requirement for anyone involved in a fatal or serious firearms incident to undergo mandatory drug and alcohol testing.
The third recommendation called for changes to the supervision of junior firearms licence holders so that an adult licence holder could only supervise one junior licence holder at one time.
Dustin was 17 when he was the victim of a shooting accident at Neerim East in August 2017. He died at Royal Melbourne Hospital with the medical cause of death determined as "gunshot wound to the head."
But Dustin's family still had questions. At the conclusion of criminal proceedings, Dustin's family wrote to the court to express concerns about the criminal proceedings and evidence that did not form part of the criminal brief.
On the day of the accident, Judge Cain reported Dustin was shooting at Neerim East with friends Daniel McConnell and KD (not his real name for legal reasons). Dustin had an expired junior firearms licence, KD held a junior firearms licence and Daniel held an adult firearms licence.
Judge Cain reported the trio had practiced shooting at a discarded television, and, KD and Dustin had been shooting at each other's feet and into puddles.
KD told police he had loaded four bullets into a .22 rifle, fired the rifle several times and believed it was empty when he placed the rifle on the bonnet of Daniel's vehicle.
The rifle fired when KD and Dustin were "laughing and joking around."
After the shooting, Dustin was bleeding from his head and the pair drove him to Neerim District Soldiers' Memorial Hospital. They formed a "pact" to say Dustin had been hit by a ricocheted bullet.
Judge Cain said KD "allegedly had a history of pointing firearms at other people" and the Buckley family claimed this should have been considered in the criminal proceedings.
"Even if KD did point the firearm at Dustin's head, the (Buckley) family noted that police told them that such an act did not automatically permit police to charge KD with manslaughter as there is no offence of pointing a weapon at a person," the judge said.
Daniel pleaded guilty to a charge of attempting to pervert the course of justice for which he was convicted and sentenced to an 18-month adjourned undertaking.
KD pleaded guilty to reckless conduct endangering life and attempting to pervert the course of justice. He was convicted and sentenced to a three-year community corrections order and 200-hours unpaid community work.
Judge Cain said to understand the circumstances of deaths similar to Dustin's, he had requested the Coroners Prevention Unit to research deaths reported to the court since January 1, 2000. The CPU identified 33 unintentional firearms deaths, among them were four - including Dustin's - that met the following criteria:
The death was unintentional;
The death was caused by a firearm;
The death was caused by an individual other than the deceased; and,
At least one of the individuals involved was displaying irresponsible behaviour with the firearms in the period immediately prior to the death.
"The CPU concluded that deaths occurring in circumstances similar to that of Dustin were not commonplace, however they were deeply distressing and potentially preventable," he said.