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

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

ByThe Associated 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 by chance discharged at school, injuring a 7-year-old classmate, police said Wednesday.

The 28-year-old woman appeared in courtroom on Wednesday on three misdemeanor youngster endangerment counts. A choose ordered her release from Cook dinner County Jail on $1,000 bond.

During the hearing, prosecutors alleged that the lady's 8-year-old son found the gun underneath her bed and took it to Walt Disney Magnet School on town’s North Side on Tuesday. The mom has a valid firearm house owners identification card.

In line with police, the backpack was in the boy's classroom when, simply earlier than 10 a.m. on Tuesday, the gun discharged. The Chicago Sun-Occasions reported that prosecutors stated in the course of 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 situation, police mentioned.

In an electronic mail to parents, the college's principal mentioned the bullet "brought about some particles to ricochet in your youngster’s classroom, which hit a member of our faculty group and brought about minor scrapes.” The college didn't respond to a request for touch upon Wednesday.

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

The girl's lawyer, Rodger Clarke, acknowledged that the gun ought to have been locked up and never simply positioned beneath the mattress. But, he said, “This wasn't one thing she deliberate or something she did on her personal volition.”

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

“This may occasionally not have been an intentional act, but it is a supremely negligent act,” he said.

He continued: “We're inches away, presumably centimeters away, from a very different case and a very different tragedy.”