'I couldn't breathe': Virginia student, 6, who shot Abigail Zwerner allegedly tried to choke another teacher in 2021
NEW PORT NEWS, VIRGINIA: A first-grade student of Richneck Elementary School, who shot his teacher Abigail Zwerner, previously showed behavioral difficulties at school, and according to a legal filing, even choked another teacher of the school, "until she couldn't breathe." The teacher who claimed to be choked in the alleged attack that took place in 2021 said that she did not receive the support she was expected to get from the school officials after reporting it to them at the time about the incident.
The other teacher recalled the alleged attack and said that the 6-year-old boy pulled back and down her neck with force after he locked his forearms in front of her neck. The Virginia youngster attacked her from behind when she was sitting in a chair in front of the classroom. The teacher who spoke to the Associated Press on the condition of anonymity as she feared possible retaliations from the school stated that the attack was stopped when the boy had to be pulled off by a teaching assistant. She said, “I didn’t feel safe the rest of the year because I knew if they didn’t protect me when he choked me and I couldn’t breathe, then they wouldn’t protect me, my kids, or my colleagues, if he did something not as harmful.”
RELATED ARTICLES
Previous incidents of 6-year-old's troubling behavior
The boy whose identity remains undisclosed because of his age had a history of troubling behavior at school where he allegedly attacked staff, teachers, and students. According to Zwerner's legal complaint filed by her attorney, Diane Toscano, the Virginia boy has repeatedly cursed at both teachers and staff and has also tried to whip his peers using his belt.
The youngster had angrily reacted to Zwerner two days before the shooting at the school on January 6 where he broke her cell phone after he "slammed" it down. He was then suspended for one day and on his return to school, he shot Zwerner using a 9mm handgun while was sitting at a reading table. In the legal notice, Toscano stated, “It is a miracle that more people were not harmed," and added, “The shooter spent his entire recess with a gun in his pocket, a gun that was loaded and ready to fire … while lots of first-grade students played.”
Two months before the shooting incident, Zwerner discussed the boy's alleged involvement in two troubling incidents. According to case documents obtained by 13 News Now, in the elementary teacher's mail to the school administrators in November 2022, she stated that on October 11, 2022, the boy stuck up his middle finger to his classmate. She then went on to explain another troubling occurrence where he pushed a classmate to the floor after he had bumped into the student "while running around the class" in November.
In her email to Principal Briana Foster Newton, the then-Principal, and Ebony Parker, the then-Assistant Principal, Zwerner wrote, "As of today, I do not feel comfortable with him returning to my classroom today." A meeting with the boy's father was suggested by Parker to address the troubled student's “behavioral difficulties” and also to “put some things in place to support” him. Citing many instances of the boy's troubling behavior at the school, the administrators failed to act. According to the notice, if Parker “had acted on the information she was provided, then the shooting of Ms. Zwerner would not have happened," the New York Post reported.
Where is the six-year-old boy now?
Following the shocking shooting incident at the Richneck Elementary School, where the six-year-old first-grade boy shot Zwerner in the chest and her left hand was taken to a medical facility, according to the news outlet. The youngster is receiving services that are unspecified. The teacher who managed to send her students out of the classroom before she collapsed after she was shot was then immediately taken to the hospital.
Police officials noted that the gun was purchased by the boy's mother. However, his access to the weapon remains unclear. The lawyer for the child and his family talked on their behalf to explain that their son is "acutely disabled." The 6-year-old's mother, whose identity was not been revealed, was not charged with a crime.