{"id":1912,"date":"2023-03-13T10:54:30","date_gmt":"2023-03-13T15:54:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/?p=1912"},"modified":"2023-03-13T10:54:31","modified_gmt":"2023-03-13T15:54:31","slug":"prosecutor-wont-charge-6-year-old-accused-of-shooting-teacher","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/?p=1912","title":{"rendered":"Prosecutor Won\u2019t Charge 6-Year-Old Accused of Shooting Teacher<\/a>"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A local prosecutor said Wednesday that he won\u2019t charge the 6-year-old boy accused of\u00a0shooting a teacher<\/a>\u00a0at his Virginia elementary school.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t believe the law supports charging a 6-year-old with a criminal offense as serious as this one,\u201d Newport News Commonwealth\u2019s Attorney Howard Gwynn\u00a0told ABC Hampton, Virginia, affiliate WVEC<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gwynn said they would have to show that \u201cany defendant, including a 6-year-old,\u201d is competent to stand trial and understands the legal system enough to help with their defense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The incident occurred at Richneck Elementary School in Newport News on Jan. 6. The 6-year-old, who has not been named publicly, allegedly brought a handgun from his home to school in his backpack and shot and wounded a teacher in a first-grade classroom in what police described as an \u201cintentional\u201d act.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The teacher, Abigail Zwerner, sustained a gunshot wound to the chest. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Abby

Abby Zwerner<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Police said the boy\u2019s mother legally purchased the 9 mm Taurus pistol.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The 6-year-old\u2019s family\u00a0released a statement<\/a>\u00a0through a spokesperson in the wake of the incident, saying, \u201cOur family has always been committed to responsible gun ownership and keeping firearms out of the reach of children.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Their son \u201csuffers from an acute disability and was under a care plan at the school that included his mother or father attending school with him and accompanying him to class every day,\u201d the family said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The student had been suspended the day before the shooting because he \u201cslammed Ms. Zwerner\u2019s phone breaking it\u201d and had cursed at the guidance counselors\u201d {snip}<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The student had allegedly been removed from the school a year prior after he \u201cchoked his teacher until she couldn\u2019t breathe\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Original article: https:\/\/www.amren.com\/news\/2023\/03\/prosecutor-wont-charge-6-year-old-accused-of-shooting-teacher\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A local prosecutor said Wednesday that he won\u2019t charge the 6-year-old boy accused of\u00a0shooting a teacher\u00a0at his Virginia elementary school. \u201cWe don\u2019t believe the law supports charging a 6-year-old with a criminal offense as serious as this one,\u201d Newport News Commonwealth\u2019s Attorney Howard Gwynn\u00a0told ABC Hampton, Virginia, affiliate WVEC Gwynn said they would have to show that \u201cany defendant, including a 6-year-old,\u201d is competent to stand trial and understands the legal system enough to help with their defense. The incident […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-crime"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1912","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1912"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1912\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1913,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1912\/revisions\/1913"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}