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Attorneys for a Virginia teacher shot by her 6-year-old student told jurors that the school’s former assistant principal ignored repeated warnings the boy had a gun, as a $40 million civil trial opened in Newport News.
The $40 million civil trial filed by first-grade teacher Abigail Zwerner, who was shot by a 6-year-old student in 2023 with a 9mm handgun, entered its opening phase Tuesday as attorneys delivered their opening remarks and the first witnesses took the stand.
The lawsuit accuses former school administrator Ebony Parker of failing to act after the first-grade teacher, the guidance counselor, the music teacher and the reading specialist informed her that the boy might have a gun. Zwerner is suing Parker, who resigned after the shooting.
“No one could have imagined that a 6-year-old first-grade student would bring a firearm into a school,” Parker’s attorney, Daniel Hogan, told jurors. “You will be able to judge for yourself whether or not this was foreseeable. That’s the heart of this case.”
In this undated photo provided by her family and lawyers, Abigail Zwerner, a first-grade teacher at Richneck Elementary School in Newport News, Va., is shown inside her classroom. Police have said a boy brought a 9mm handgun to school and intentionally shot Zwerner as she was teaching her first-grade class. (Family of Abigail Zwerner via AP, File)
On Jan. 6, 2023, the boy pulled the gun from his hoodie and shot the 25-year-old teacher, with the bullet tearing through her left hand and lodging in her chest.
“1:58 p.m., BANG!” Zwerner’s attorney, Diane Toscano, said in opening statements. “A bullet went through Abby’s hand, then through her chest.” The bullet is still in Zwerner’s body because it’s too dangerous to remove, she added.
Zwerner’s lawyer accused Parker of being grossly negligent because she had several opportunities to confiscate the gun based on the information provided by others.
“She made bad decisions that day,” Toscano said.
Hogan said that decision-making in a public school setting is “cooperative” and “collaborative.” He also warned of hindsight bias and “Monday morning quarterbacking.”
“The law knows that it is fundamentally unfair to judge another person’s decisions based on stuff that came up after the fact,” Hogan said. “The law requires you to examine people’s decisions at the time they make them.”
Ebony Parker was released on bond in Newport News, Va., Apr. 10, 2024. (Newport News Police Department)
Dr. Nina Farrish, the director of human resources for Newport News Public Schools, testified that Parker admitted to her two or three days after the shooting that it was reported around 12:20 p.m. the student had a gun in his backpack. That was more than 90 minutes before the shooting.
Amy Kovac, the reading specialist, was in Parker’s office when Zwerner told Parker the boy had threatened a kindergartner and had been aggressive with a security officer during lunch. Parker never looked up at Zwerner, who had to leave to return to class, Kovac testified.
“She told me I could tell [Zwerner] that she could call his mom at any time to come pick him up,” Kovac testified Tuesday.
When she confronted the 6-year-old, she recalled telling him, “Can I have the bag?” and the boy replied, “No, no one is getting that bag.”
Kovac said she immediately warned Parker, only to be brushed off: “She did say, well, he has little pockets.”
Kovac testified that she pressed Parker again, saying the child might have slipped the weapon into his jacket pocket. Minutes later, after hearing the gunshot, Kovac ran to Zwerner’s classroom.
“I felt like I had a bubble of God around me, and I walked straight to him,” she told jurors.
The boy, she said, stood “with his legs kind of spread open, arms crossed and cocked.”
Kovac testified she grabbed his wrist and restrained him, using Zwerner’s phone to call for help.
“I said, this is Richneck. A teacher’s been shot. I have the shooter. Send help.”
A Newport News police officer directs traffic at Richneck Elementary School in Newport News, Va., on Monday Jan. 30, 2023. (AP Photo/John C. Clark)
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Another first-grade teacher at the school, Jennifer West, testified Tuesday that a “visibly nervous” student told her after recess that the 6-year-old had a gun on him and he saw the firearm and bullet.
She said she called the front office to report this to an administrator, per protocol, and also spoke to a school counselor about it.
The counselor, Rolonzo Rawles, testified Tuesday that he asked Parker if he could search the child’s person for a gun, and that she responded that the student’s mother would be arriving to get him soon and to wait to check him then.
“I didn’t want to step over any boundaries, so I wasn’t going to check him without permission,” Rawles said.
Newport News, Virginia schoolteacher Abby Zwerner appears in a Newport News, Virginia, courtroom, Friday, Oct. 27, 2023. (Billy Schuerman/The Virginian-Pilot via AP, File)
Toscano argued that Parker had the authority as the assistant principal to act.
“Who would think a 6-year-old is going to bring a gun to school and shoot their teacher?” she said. “Dr. Parker’s job is to believe that is possible.”
Parker faces a separate criminal trial next month on eight counts of felony child neglect, one for “each of the eight bullets that endangered all the students” in Zwerner’s classroom, prosecutors said.
Deja Taylor turned herself in, according to the Newport News Police Department. She was sentenced to two years in prison for felony neglect and federal weapons charges. (Newport News Police Department)
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The mother of the boy who shot Zwerner, Deja Taylor, was sentenced to two years in prison for felony neglect and federal weapons charges.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.