Anything can kill or maim you, if you are unlucky enough. Example being that if he'd managed to shoot her in the eye- that would do some major damage and the pain could cause them to go into shock and die. Fire close enough, it could theoretically get to the brain. Not to mention the emotional trauma part of this- as someone who's had a loaded, safety disengaged, finger-on-the-trigger- pellet gun that was used for bird hunting pointed at their face when they were ten, I STILL get nervous when around pellet guns. Especially since the nutjob teen that did it fired at the wall behind my head and then laughed at me for being upset.