William “Will” Kenneth Anderson, 4, a White male, died on December 28, 2015, in Bethel, Alaska, after a gunshot wound sustained inside Alaska State Trooper housing. Investigators said the boy had been playing alone in the living room when he obtained a privately owned handgun and fatally shot himself. Emergency responders rushed to the scene, but he did not survive. An autopsy was requested by authorities through the State Medical Examiner's office to formally document the circumstances of his death.
Details released at the time noted that two adults and two other children were elsewhere in the home, and no one was in the room when the gun discharged. Officials also said Will's father, a state trooper, was not at home when the incident occurred. The description of the weapon as a personal firearm—rather than a service weapon—was emphasized in early reports, framing the tragedy as an apparent accidental, self-inflicted shooting.
Subsequent public accounts and incident listings have treated the case as a self-inflicted shooting with no indication of criminal involvement. There have been no publicly announced arrests, no named suspects, and no charges reported in connection with Will's death. Contemporary news coverage and later incident databases reflect the absence of any criminal suspects, underscoring the initial assessment that this was a heartbreaking accident inside trooper housing.
