Gun in 8-year-old’s backpack goes off at college, mom charged

Chicago police say a mom has been charged with baby endangerment after a gun in her second grader’s backpack by accident discharged at school, injuring a 7-year-old classmate

ByThe Associated Press

18 Could 2022, 23:06

• 2 min read

CHICAGO -- A Chicago mother has been charged with child endangerment after a gun in her second grader's backpack unintentionally discharged in school, injuring a 7-year-old classmate, police mentioned Wednesday.

The 28-year-old lady appeared in court docket on Wednesday on three misdemeanor little one endangerment counts. A decide ordered her release from Prepare dinner County Jail on $1,000 bond.

Through the listening to, prosecutors alleged that the lady's 8-year-old son found the gun underneath her bed and took it to Walt Disney Magnet College on the city’s North Aspect on Tuesday. The mom has a legitimate firearm house owners identification card.

According to police, the backpack was within the boy's classroom when, just earlier than 10 a.m. on Tuesday, the gun discharged. The Chicago Solar-Instances reported that prosecutors said during the hearing that the bullet ricocheted off the ground and grazed the kid's abdomen. The kid was taken to a hospital in good situation, police said.

In an email to folks, the varsity's principal mentioned the bullet "prompted some debris to ricochet in your child’s classroom, which hit a member of our faculty group and brought on minor scrapes.” The college did not respond to a request for touch upon Wednesday.

A trainer then grabbed the backpack and gave it to safety officers who discovered a Glock 19 handgun inside, prosecutors said through the listening to.

The lady's lawyer, Rodger Clarke, acknowledged that the gun should have been locked up and not just placed beneath the bed. However, he said, “This wasn't one thing she deliberate or one thing she did on her own volition.”

Cook dinner County Choose Michael Hogan was not impressed by that argument.

“This may occasionally not have been an intentional act, however it's a supremely negligent act,” he mentioned.

He continued: “We are inches away, presumably centimeters away, from a really completely different case and a very different tragedy.”