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

Chicago police say a mother has been charged with child endangerment after a gun in her second grader’s backpack by chance discharged at college, injuring a 7-year-old classmate

ByThe Related Press

18 Might 2022, 23:06

• 2 min learn

CHICAGO -- A Chicago mom has been charged with little one 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 woman appeared in court docket on Wednesday on three misdemeanor baby endangerment counts. A decide ordered her launch from Cook dinner County Jail on $1,000 bond.

Through the hearing, prosecutors alleged that the girl's 8-year-old son discovered the gun beneath her mattress and took it to Walt Disney Magnet College on town’s North Facet on Tuesday. The mom has a sound firearm homeowners identification card.

According to police, the backpack was within the boy's classroom when, simply before 10 a.m. on Tuesday, the gun discharged. The Chicago Solar-Occasions reported that prosecutors mentioned in the course of the listening to that the bullet ricocheted off the floor and grazed the kid's stomach. The kid was taken to a hospital in good situation, police said.

In an e mail to parents, the college's principal mentioned the bullet "brought about some debris to ricochet in your youngster’s classroom, which hit a member of our faculty neighborhood and induced minor scrapes.” The school didn't respond to a request for comment on Wednesday.

A instructor then grabbed the backpack and gave it to safety officers who found a Glock 19 handgun inside, prosecutors said through the hearing.

The lady's attorney, Rodger Clarke, acknowledged that the gun ought to have been locked up and not just positioned under the bed. However, he mentioned, “This wasn't something she deliberate or one thing she did on her own volition.”

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

“This will not have been an intentional act, however it's a supremely negligent act,” he said.

He continued: “We are inches away, possibly centimeters away, from a very different case and a very totally different tragedy.”