Already have an account?
Get back to the

Jose Canseco Shoots Off His Finger While Cleaning Weapon

Jose Canseco
Former baseball superstar Jose Canseco accidentally shot his hand while cleaning his gun on Tuesday, Oct. 28; "The middle finger was hanging by a thread," his fiancee Leila Knight said.

Uh oh! Former professional baseball slugger Jose Canseco accidentally shot himself in the hand on Tuesday, Oct. 28, as he was cleaning his gun in his Las Vegas home, police told CNN.

His fiancee, actress and model Leila Knight, tweeted that Canseco was in surgery shortly after the incident occurred.

According to Las Vegas police, 50-year-old Canseco was cleaning out his semiautomatic handgun when it accidentally fired off. Knight told the New York Daily News that her fiance was cleaning one of his four guns in their kitchen when the incident occurred. Apparently, it blew off the middle finger of Canseco's left hand.

Related: PHOTOS: Celebrity baseball fans

“He had been at the shooting range a few days earlier. He didn’t know it was loaded,” Knight revealed to the paper. "The middle finger was hanging by a thread, and I wrapped his hand in a towel and then called 911. The doctors said they would either have to amputate or do reconstructive surgery. But if they do surgery, he won’t be able to use it again. He blew away an artery and a big bone chunk."

When police arrived on the scene, police asked whether the two had gotten into a fight. "I said, 'Of course we weren’t,'" she replied, explaining that Canseco leaves guns in the home for self-defense. (The couple first met in the Playboy Mansion and have been together since 2009. She filed a temporary restraining order against him in 2011 for harassment, but the two later reconciled and he proposed.)

Related: PHOTOS: The biggest Olympic scandals ever

"We have four guns in the house. We are now going to have zero. I hate guns," Knight said. "Jose is a little freaked out. He keeps saying, 'Sorry, sorry.' But we’re extremely lucky, lucky it wasn’t worse, or that he didn’t shoot me."

During his career, Canseco (affectionately known as a "Bash Brother") was a home run machine, hitting more than 450 total over the course of 17 seasons in the MLB. He controversially admitted to using steroids and performance enhancing drugs, which he derailed in his 2005 memoir, Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant 'Roids, Smash Hits and How Baseball Got Big.

Got a Tip form close button
Got a tip for US?
We're All Ears for Celebrity Buzz!