Gun in 8-year-old’s backpack goes off at school, mother charged

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

ByThe Related Press

18 May 2022, 23:06

• 2 min read

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

The 28-year-old girl appeared in court on Wednesday on three misdemeanor baby endangerment counts. A judge ordered her release from Prepare dinner County Jail on $1,000 bond.

In the course of the hearing, prosecutors alleged that the girl's 8-year-old son found the gun beneath her mattress and took it to Walt Disney Magnet School on the town’s North Side on Tuesday. The mom has a sound firearm house owners identification card.

In keeping with police, the backpack was in the boy's classroom when, just before 10 a.m. on Tuesday, the gun discharged. The Chicago Solar-Occasions reported that prosecutors said through the listening to that the bullet ricocheted off the ground and grazed the child's abdomen. The kid was taken to a hospital in good condition, police said.

In an electronic mail to parents, the varsity's principal mentioned the bullet "brought on some particles to ricochet in your youngster’s classroom, which hit a member of our faculty community and caused minor scrapes.” The varsity didn't reply to a request for comment on Wednesday.

A trainer then grabbed the backpack and gave it to safety officers who discovered a Glock 19 handgun inside, prosecutors stated in the course of the listening to.

The woman's legal professional, Rodger Clarke, acknowledged that the gun should have been locked up and not simply placed underneath the mattress. However, he said, “This wasn't something she deliberate or something 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, but it's a supremely negligent act,” he stated.

He continued: “We're inches away, probably centimeters away, from a really completely different case and a really different tragedy.”