Boy, 6, arrested for shooting teacher and leaving her critically injured at Virginia elementary school
NEWPORT NEWS, VIRGINIA: A six-year-old boy has been arrested in connection with a school shooting in Virginia on Friday, January 6. The unidentified shooter is believed to have deliberately shot his first-grade teacher at Richneck Elementary School, leaving her critically injured. The female teacher who is in her 30's was rushed to Riverside Regional Medical Center after suffering from a gunshot wound in the stomach. Police informed no students were harmed in the altercation and an investigation is undergoing as they figure out how a child got access to the gun.
"The individual is a six-year-old student and is right now in police custody," said Newport News Chief Scott Drew adding, "This was not an accidental shooting." "It was in a classroom, an altercation took place there." "We did not have a situation where someone was going around the school shooting. We had a situation in one particular location where a gunshot was fired," reported Daily Mail. Apparently, the grandmother of one of the students said the child had allegedly "brought bullets to school last week and said he would bring his gun."
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However, it is unclear if it is the same child involved in the shooting, but the grandmother claimed the school was aware of the incident and did not take an action. "A parent told the school they did nothing, now look," she wrote on Facebook, as per the source. "The parents outside stated that their child told them a kid brought golden shiny bullets to school and was thinking about bringing his gun. The student told the parent, who informed the school. And the school just yesterday got back to the parent saying the parent of the kid said it was a nerf bullet and the parent said nerf bullets aren't shiny and gold."
Superintendent George Parker said, if the school is suspicious of such incidents, they have the capability of metal-detecting students. They do not perform the test on every student, every day but every district is allowed to do so. "When we have a perceived threat or issue, we do random metal detection on those days," Parker said. "Today, our students got a lesson in gun violence," he added. "We need to keep the guns out of the hands of our young people." The school will be closed on Monday to work on "mental health of our staff and students," Parker concluded.
A furious British parent of one of the students, who is currently based in the US as her husband is in the military, is demanding the country control the gun violence problem. "Guns, that's the biggest problem in this country," she told WTKR. "Why is there a seven-year-old with a bloody gun? ... How does a seven-year-old have a gun?" "I'm only here because my husband is in the military. Otherwise, I would not have chosen to come to this country," she further said.