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

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

ByThe Associated Press

18 Might 2022, 23:06

• 2 min learn

CHICAGO -- A Chicago 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, police stated Wednesday.

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

During the hearing, prosecutors alleged that the girl's 8-year-old son discovered the gun beneath her bed and took it to Walt Disney Magnet Faculty on town’s North Side on Tuesday. The mom has a sound firearm owners identification card.

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

In an email to oldsters, the school's principal stated the bullet "prompted some particles to ricochet in your youngster’s classroom, which hit a member of our faculty group and triggered minor scrapes.” The college didn't respond to a request for touch upon Wednesday.

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

The lady's attorney, Rodger Clarke, acknowledged that the gun should have been locked up and not simply positioned below the bed. However, he stated, “This wasn't something she planned or something she did on her own volition.”

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

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

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