By BEN FINLEY and DENISE LAVOIE (Related Press)
NEWPORT NEWS, Va. (AP) — Authorities plan to supply updates Monday on the capturing of a Virginia elementary faculty trainer by a 6-year-old scholar, and the neighborhood will later maintain a candlelight vigil.
The Newport Information police division mentioned that the police chief, mayor and college superintendent will maintain a information convention at 4 p.m. to debate the capturing that occurred on Friday at Richneck Elementary Faculty. A vigil is deliberate at 6:30 p.m. for the wounded trainer, Abby Zwerner.
Police Chief Steve Drew has mentioned the boy shot and wounded Zwerner with a handgun in a first-grade classroom on Friday. Shortly after the capturing, police mentioned Zwerner had life-threatening accidents, however she has improved and was listed in steady situation at an area hospital.
Principal Briana Foster Newton mentioned in an replace on the varsity’s web site that Zwerner has been in a position to speak to household and pals. The college might be closed for the week.
The boy was later taken into police custody. Drew mentioned the capturing was not unintended and was a part of an altercation. No college students had been injured.
Police have declined to explain what led to the altercation or another particulars about what occurred within the classroom, citing the continued investigation. They’ve additionally declined to say how the boy obtained entry to the gun or who owns the weapon.
Virginia legislation doesn’t permit 6-year-olds to be tried as adults. As well as, a 6-year-old is simply too younger to be dedicated to the custody of the Division of Juvenile Justice if discovered responsible. Authorities haven’t specified the place the boy was being held.
On Monday morning, a number of dad and mom, grandparents and neighborhood members gathered with an area pastor in an open patch of grass outdoors the varsity.
Amongst them was father or mother Eric Billet, who mentioned every of his three kids within the Newport Information faculty system, two of whom go to Richneck, has reacted in another way to the capturing.
Billet’s son who’s in center faculty has raised issues about faculty safety, telling his dad that he felt safer at theme parks, which the boy argued had higher safety than his faculty. His second-grade son is doing higher, Billet mentioned, fist-bumping a police officer on his method out of college Friday.
His daughter, a fourth-grader, has had nightmares each night time, Billet mentioned.
However on the similar time, he mentioned, “she was additionally upset she couldn’t go to high school this week.”
___ Lavoie reported from Richmond.