WENDELL — Four children were removed from their home Wednesday after authorities found them living in filth, the Gooding County sheriff said.

Idaho Health and Welfare was called Wednesday to investigate the children’s living situation after a 3-year-old boy shot his 5-year-old sister with a 9mm pistol, Sheriff Shaun Gough said.

The shooting was an accident, Gough said Friday, and the parents face no charges in connection with the shooting.

But the home “was a filthy mess,” he said. The children, ages approximately 2 to 8, are now in temporary foster care.

“Health and Welfare has a safety plan,” the sheriff said. The parents “have to do certain things before they can get them back.”

The father was at work and the children were at home with their mother Wednesday morning when the boy climbed on a freezer chest to reach the top of a refrigerator, where two 9mm pistols were kept, Gough said.

One pistol had a lock; the other didn’t, he said.

“They said both were supposed to be locked,” Gough said, “but we never found the (second) lock.”

The shot went through the girl’s right arm but hit no bones.

Gough didn’t identify the family, but he said the shooting happened in a rented home in the 600 block of West Avenue F in Wendell.