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

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

ByThe Related Press

18 May 2022, 23:06

• 2 min read

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

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

In the course of the hearing, prosecutors alleged that the woman's 8-year-old son discovered the gun underneath her mattress and took it to Walt Disney Magnet College on the city’s North Side on Tuesday. The mother has a valid firearm owners identification card.

In line with police, the backpack was within the boy's classroom when, just earlier than 10 a.m. on Tuesday, the gun discharged. The Chicago Sun-Times reported that prosecutors said through the listening to that the bullet ricocheted off the floor and grazed the kid's stomach. The child was taken to a hospital in good situation, police mentioned.

In an e-mail to parents, the varsity's principal said the bullet "triggered some particles to ricochet in your child’s classroom, which hit a member of our school group and caused minor scrapes.” The college did not respond to a request for touch upon Wednesday.

A trainer then grabbed the backpack and gave it to security officers who discovered a Glock 19 handgun inside, prosecutors stated throughout the hearing.

The woman's lawyer, Rodger Clarke, acknowledged that the gun should have been locked up and not simply placed below the bed. However, he mentioned, “This wasn't one thing she deliberate or something she did on her personal volition.”

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

“This may increasingly 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 really totally different case and a very completely different tragedy.”