May 18, 2026
Criminal Trial Begins For Assistant Principal, Charged After First Grader Shoots Teacher
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RSS Feed A historic trial is underway today for Dr. Ebony Parker, the former assistant principal of a Virginia elementary school. Parker is charged with 8 counts of child abuse after one of her students shot his first grade teacher in class back in 2023. It’s the first time a school educator has been held criminally responsible for a school shooting. Parker is being accused of ignoring repeated warning signs that the 6-year-old had brought a gun to school.
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00:00:02
Speaker 1: Hey, that folks did is Monday, May eighteenth, and this morning just underway.
00:00:06
Speaker 2: What is it believed believed to be the.
00:00:08
Speaker 1: First criminal trial of a school administrator who is being held responsible for a shooting at the school. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJA. This has, I mean, nobody can find another case. We've seen parents being held responsible, We've seen police officers, school resource officers being taken into court.
00:00:26
Speaker 2: This time it's an assistant principle.
00:00:28
Speaker 3: Yes, this they believe is the first of its kind, and a criminal trial is underway right now in Newport News, Virginia. A former assistant principal, her name is doctor Ebony Parker, is facing eight felony counts of child neglect. And I was trying to figure out how they came up with eight counts because one school teacher, a first grade teacher, was shot in this incident. She did survive. But the eight felony counts are for the eight bullets that was in that loaded gun that was brought to school by a six year old three years ago in January of twenty twenty three.
00:01:08
Speaker 1: A lot of people remember this case because it was wild. Well, you talking about a six year old when you hear about a school shooting. But yes, a six year old kid, very troubled, by all accounts, brought a gun to school, shot the teacher in the chest in hand.
00:01:19
Speaker 2: The teacher is.
00:01:20
Speaker 1: Okay, But that teacher Robes did win a civil suit. This wasn't too long ago, at the end of last year, and a lot of people will remember that. But a civil jury certainly thought that this teacher excuse me, assistant principle was responsible.
00:01:34
Speaker 3: Uh. Yes, the teacher is Abby's warner. Again. She was a first grade teacher, and you mentioned, Yeah, she was shot in the chest, in the hand she was reading. She was reading in her classroom, she was at a table. She spent nearly two weeks in the hospital, She had six surgeries, She doesn't have the full use of her left hand, and by doctor's accounts, sh just by a small margin. Did she survive. Actually, because because this bullet that this six year old shot at her is inches from her spine and vital organs, and it's actually in such a dangerous place they can't even remove it. So she will die with that bullet inside of hers. So this took I guess I describe all of that to say this has obviously significantly impacted this teacher's life. And yes, a jury awarded her ten million dollars for Parker's basically failure to act. Failure to act on repeated They said there were at least three different occasions where she was told there were suspicions this kid was bragging about this this gun to kids throughout the day, and they say she failed in her duties to search fully search this child to make sure this child didn't have a gun.
00:02:46
Speaker 1: And it was her responsibility. Why a principle, It wasn't the principle. This is an assistant principle we're talking about. But she was the one in charge at the time and was had these incidents of I mean, there was a threat of security threat to the school and she did not follow up on it. Her attorney have their own reason for why she shouldn't have been the one to do so, But the point is a civil jury didn't see it that way. So we talk and were talking about a six year old kid. Why in God's name is a six year old kid have a gun. There was a history of all kinds of trouble in this kid's home, trouble with this kid at school, to the point of you can't even understand why the six year old Robes was even allowed to continue in school with other kids. Some of these incidents were not just picking on or poking or pushing or there were some very serious incidents they had they described involving this kid.
00:03:32
Speaker 2: And in this particular incident, there were kids that.
00:03:36
Speaker 1: Reported to their teachers or to other kids that they had actually laid eyes on the gun. So it wasn't just a rumor thing. It was just a matter of opening a kid's bag, and for whatever reason, she didn't do so.
00:03:46
Speaker 2: So the civil.
00:03:47
Speaker 1: Jury heard all this, and a criminal jury is about to hear the same evidence.
00:03:52
Speaker 3: Yeah, so this is a serious She's facing five years for each charge. So depending on how if she's found guilty of these, she could be looking up to forty years behind bars. So this is a serious situation where you've got somebody who, yes, was essentially in charge of a school doctor, Ebene Parker, and now she could be headed to prison. So her life is truly on the line at this point. And this trial they say is expected to last four or five days. We've been watching there's a live stream, and I say live stream going on, but it is delay. There was some back and forth last week about whether or not cameras would even be allowed in this Newport News courtroom, and the judge landed on allowing one camera, a pool camera, to basically document what's going on in that courtroom, but they'll be on a thirty minute delay. So that was the compromise that was made. So this is obviously something that folks all around the country are watching, and certainly school districts. This has far reaching impacts if a school administrator is found criminally responsible for the actions of a student under her care.
00:05:01
Speaker 1: But there's some unique I don't know how often or how much we will see this, but I certainly thought Robes that given where we are and what we've seen, frankly since Columbine, you can go back to that. There's just been a different mindset when it comes to security around schools. You're told a kid has a gun and you don't even open the bag. Is confusing and is a unique situation. I can't imagine, well, if this is a junior high school or a high school, a principle being told, hey, here there's a gun, or you wouldn't immediately go check it out. I don't know if it had, if it played into the mindset of this assistant principle.
00:05:38
Speaker 2: It's a six year old. It's a six year old.
00:05:41
Speaker 1: No, of course, you don't think a six year old would have a gun, but Jesus crime, ay have we not learned a little better? So she's in try on court in court this morningy're supposed to have jury selection and heads up to anybody. As you were just mentioning, the live stream robes is important. The one camera thing and the one the pool camera. We've watched a lot of ty. This one does not have good video or audio. There's one camera angle and the attorney's backs are to you, so you can't see their mouths moving at all to try to match with the audio and the one defense attorney it's kind of soft spoken, so just the heads up is actually hard to follow a little bit, and even the judge is a little soft spoken. So I just want to throw this out there at this crappy audio.
00:06:23
Speaker 3: Yeah, if anyone at home it wants to listen to it and watch these proceedings like we often do. No, just to play off of that you actually had, And we do this oftentimes when we're watching these trials, we have them up on a speaker in the house so we can really try to hear what's going on inside that courtroom. And even with that speaker, it's been difficult to understand exactly what's going on in that courtroom. But we certainly will be following this again four to five days, and there's already an issue. So they say that, but my goodness, if it's starting out this way, who knows how long this will last as the trial continues, But certainly there is so much at stake, and we are expecting by the way, Abby's Werner, the teacher who was shot in this case, and by the way, she's recovered, as we pointed out, with some injuries, but she is expected to testify in this trial as she did in the civil lawsuit, and by all accounts, she is a compelling witness.
00:07:15
Speaker 1: But we don't know when we're going to see her. We don't know how exactly long this trial is going to go. We're told you just said the number of days and what's expected, and that's certainly already. I just met this judge and she is not messing around with time. So jury selection is supposed to get started this morning they are in court. They are alive as we speak. But they started out to address Robes a couple of issues that the attorneys had, one of them being the defense attorney who asked for a continuance.
00:07:45
Speaker 3: Right at the beginning.
00:07:46
Speaker 2: She almost laughed at them.
00:07:47
Speaker 3: She did because look this, by the way, this took place three years ago. The civil lawsuit, as we pointed out, was over with the November. They've had plenty of pre trial hearings, and one as recently as last week. And so the judge said, you have issue, Why are you bringing it up now? You had several opportunities to bring up any sort of issue you had, and now day one of the trial is not the day to bring up this issue.
00:08:11
Speaker 1: I felt bad for him, and it might have been why he was I couldn't hear him because he was a little being a little softer in his requests, because it seemed ridiculous. She talked about, you got the whole We just had a trial, a civil trial. What do you mean all the evidence is over there. They were making an argument this morning that they didn't have a particular piece of police bodycam video. They claim that someone on that bodycam video expressed that they thought the kid's gun was a toy gun. So that the attorney is arguing, you know what, that one little bit of video, we don't have it, we can't find it, and that is exculpatory evidence. We think that could prove she's innocent in this case. We ain't got it, need a continuance to go find it. She said, negro please, And I say that because he is black and she is black as well. Sorry, that's how we talked with each other.
00:08:56
Speaker 2: Sometimes.
00:08:57
Speaker 1: She really looked at him like, are you effing kidding me? After all this time, the video exists, it's out there.
00:09:05
Speaker 2: You know it, you claim you don't have it.
00:09:07
Speaker 1: So he started out first thing this morning, and she already has a group of forty one potential jurors sitting in the back waiting. That's one thing, Robes we've noticed about judges. They hate to waste these people's time.
00:09:19
Speaker 3: Yep. And this woman from the get go looks like she is not going to She made it very very clear where she stands on this, and she does look to be a no nonsense kind of judge. We're learning a lot as we watch all these trials and different judges handle things distinctly, but certainly this woman looks as though she is not going to be taking any sort of delay tactics or anything that's going to, as you point out, waste the jurors time ten minutes.
00:09:44
Speaker 1: I like her already ten minutes of watching her, because she actually agreed with him. She said, you know what, I agree that based on it she gave some case precedent and case law and all this stuff in this case, thought this was excessed. She actually agreed that, yes, that could be entered as something exculpatory. You can make that argument a trial.
00:10:02
Speaker 2: Let's move on.
00:10:03
Speaker 1: Really knock yourself out, but I'm not going to delay this trial once again because you can't find something or claim something that's been used in a trial that went on for months.
00:10:13
Speaker 2: You can't find it.
00:10:14
Speaker 1: Seemed a little don't know if that's the direction they're going to start going, But she wasn't having it, so I appreciate it that very much. So, yes, it seems like rodes this will be a quick trial because of huh.
00:10:24
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly exactly. So as we continue to follow this story and certainly what ends up happening to doctor Ebony Parker over the next coming days. When we come back, we're going to tell you about several other people who have also faced charges or had some sort of fallout based on what happened three years ago in that Newport News classroom. Welcome back, everyone to this episode of Amy and TJ. We are covering the beginning of a hissed trial in Newport News, Virginia. An assistant principal, a former assistant principle, is now being held criminally responsible for her six year old student shooting his first grade teacher. The accusation is that she did not do what she should have done to prevent this shooting. There are at least at least folks will be testifying at least three different times. She was warned, she was told that this six year old student had a loaded gun, and she didn't do what she should have done. She should have checked his bag, she should have searched the student. None of that took place, and a first grade teacher was shot because of it. Now, the boy's mother, I was curious about this Deja Taylor. She is actually currently behind bars. She is serving a four year sentence. She pleaded guilty to state and federal charges. But she and that makes a lot of sense. We have seen parents now being held criminally responsible. You would think that would have to be the case. You can't charge a six year old, and so authorities first and foremost went after his mother.
00:12:02
Speaker 1: Do I have right she was serving for something else? That sentence hasn't even started yet.
00:12:06
Speaker 3: Yes, correct, she had other issues going on which might lead to the situation where you find a child, because that is the big question. How could a six year old? I always describe like that age first graders. They are the sweetest, just sponges. They're absorbing everything, and unfortunately he was absorbing it appears all the wrong things in that house. It was difficult, but several school officials also lost their jobs in this case as well. We know the assistant principal who's now on trial is she resigned almost immediately two weeks after the shooting, but the principal in the school was reassigned. School board voted out the superintendent. There have been some significant fallout In addition, and this makes sense, Newport News Public Schools implemented significant security changes after this. I didn't realize this. Can you imagine just we send sabine to school all student kindergarten through twelfth grade in Newport, News have to use clear backpacks.
00:13:08
Speaker 1: I'm okay with that, or across the country. I don't mind it in at least in the least bit. I have a problem with the yonder pouches that you have to lock your phones up every day. But if you want everybody to walk in clear and eliminate one part of the problem, sure, maybe a kid can put it in his waistband, put it in his pocket, put fine. But I got zero problem with that, and I wish more would address that versus taking the phone away from a kid who might be able to call when there is an emergency. So I'm sorry. There was mo my parenting I got in middle school here, so God. But now I haven't heard anybody else doing that, and I'm okay with it.
00:13:44
Speaker 3: That's the first. I mean, obviously, if you attend any sort of a game in a stadium, a football game, a basketball game, a concert, even, we're kind of used to these clear bags, and that actually makes me feel safe for going into a stadium, going into any large crowd, knowing that everyone's gone through the same checkpoint and certainly only has clear backs. But I had never heard of clear backpacks for students, but that was put into place after this shooting. In addition, there are now weapon detection systems across all middle and high schools in Newport News.
00:14:17
Speaker 1: That's, yeah, fine to be careful, be safe, but you don't want kids to feel like they're going into a prison every time they're going to school, which you also want them to feel safe when they go into school, So there's some balancing act there. But I'm just okay with all these things you're putting in place. There's another system you can put in place that when somebody says the kid has a gun, you go look in the bag. We're doing all this because somebody didn't look in a bag when they were told a gun was in the bag.
00:14:42
Speaker 2: Okay.
00:14:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, and this kid, I mean, by all accounts you were mentioning on that school yard during lunch basically because the shooting happened around two pm. But when they were all out for recess, he was, as you said, showing kids the gun and then telling them if you tell anyone, I'll shoot and kill you. So this was a kid who came in with the mission and just thank goodness that first grade teacher, yeah, not survived.
00:15:03
Speaker 1: Not an accidental shooting. It's part of it. You first hear say, oh my goodness, you brought a gun and something happened. No, no, no, he pulled this thing out with intent, they say, was pulling the trigger. What the actual a six year old? I don't know a six year old I've ever met in my life that I thought was capable of something like that.
00:15:17
Speaker 3: No, and that could possibly be part of her defense, Like, who would ever think a six year old not only would bring a gun, a loaded gun, and then know how to aim and shoot that gun?
00:15:28
Speaker 1: Well, was there an argument, There was some language they were using to watch she wasn't legally responsible, she didn't have that was I kind of remember the But they did have a defense obviously didn't work in the civil trial. But they might be hoping, or at least the teacher is hoping that the assistant principle is found not guilty in the criminal trial. This is wild now that the Virginia was it School Risk Association or share Risk Association. Is this pool of insurers who are the ones on the hook for paying a ten million if the assistant principle is found guilty, they could argue, we don't have any liability. Now because it was actually criminal behavior that caused the incident, we.
00:16:18
Speaker 2: Don't have to pay.
00:16:19
Speaker 3: Wow.
00:16:19
Speaker 1: So the teacher who now won the civil judgment is sitting and maybe hoping this woman is acquitted so she can get a ten million.
00:16:30
Speaker 3: I had not thought of.
00:16:31
Speaker 2: This was called the Virginia.
00:16:33
Speaker 1: Risk Sharing Association, this group of insurers that does it, and they're standing birobes see what happens. I can't imagine the teacher having to look and want civil trial, want her guilty, criminal trial. I want her guilty, but that means I don't get my money.
00:16:47
Speaker 3: Well, she's going to be testifying, so that will be very interesting to see if that plays at all in what she says, how she says it, and what the jury thinks about her testimony. But we will be watching this trial. It will be fascinating and it will be precedent setting. So we always appreciate listening to us. Everyone. I'm Amy Roebuck alongside TJ. Holmes. We will talk to you soon.
Speaker 1: Hey, that folks did is Monday, May eighteenth, and this morning just underway.
00:00:06
Speaker 2: What is it believed believed to be the.
00:00:08
Speaker 1: First criminal trial of a school administrator who is being held responsible for a shooting at the school. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJA. This has, I mean, nobody can find another case. We've seen parents being held responsible, We've seen police officers, school resource officers being taken into court.
00:00:26
Speaker 2: This time it's an assistant principle.
00:00:28
Speaker 3: Yes, this they believe is the first of its kind, and a criminal trial is underway right now in Newport News, Virginia. A former assistant principal, her name is doctor Ebony Parker, is facing eight felony counts of child neglect. And I was trying to figure out how they came up with eight counts because one school teacher, a first grade teacher, was shot in this incident. She did survive. But the eight felony counts are for the eight bullets that was in that loaded gun that was brought to school by a six year old three years ago in January of twenty twenty three.
00:01:08
Speaker 1: A lot of people remember this case because it was wild. Well, you talking about a six year old when you hear about a school shooting. But yes, a six year old kid, very troubled, by all accounts, brought a gun to school, shot the teacher in the chest in hand.
00:01:19
Speaker 2: The teacher is.
00:01:20
Speaker 1: Okay, But that teacher Robes did win a civil suit. This wasn't too long ago, at the end of last year, and a lot of people will remember that. But a civil jury certainly thought that this teacher excuse me, assistant principle was responsible.
00:01:34
Speaker 3: Uh. Yes, the teacher is Abby's warner. Again. She was a first grade teacher, and you mentioned, Yeah, she was shot in the chest, in the hand she was reading. She was reading in her classroom, she was at a table. She spent nearly two weeks in the hospital, She had six surgeries, She doesn't have the full use of her left hand, and by doctor's accounts, sh just by a small margin. Did she survive. Actually, because because this bullet that this six year old shot at her is inches from her spine and vital organs, and it's actually in such a dangerous place they can't even remove it. So she will die with that bullet inside of hers. So this took I guess I describe all of that to say this has obviously significantly impacted this teacher's life. And yes, a jury awarded her ten million dollars for Parker's basically failure to act. Failure to act on repeated They said there were at least three different occasions where she was told there were suspicions this kid was bragging about this this gun to kids throughout the day, and they say she failed in her duties to search fully search this child to make sure this child didn't have a gun.
00:02:46
Speaker 1: And it was her responsibility. Why a principle, It wasn't the principle. This is an assistant principle we're talking about. But she was the one in charge at the time and was had these incidents of I mean, there was a threat of security threat to the school and she did not follow up on it. Her attorney have their own reason for why she shouldn't have been the one to do so, But the point is a civil jury didn't see it that way. So we talk and were talking about a six year old kid. Why in God's name is a six year old kid have a gun. There was a history of all kinds of trouble in this kid's home, trouble with this kid at school, to the point of you can't even understand why the six year old Robes was even allowed to continue in school with other kids. Some of these incidents were not just picking on or poking or pushing or there were some very serious incidents they had they described involving this kid.
00:03:32
Speaker 2: And in this particular incident, there were kids that.
00:03:36
Speaker 1: Reported to their teachers or to other kids that they had actually laid eyes on the gun. So it wasn't just a rumor thing. It was just a matter of opening a kid's bag, and for whatever reason, she didn't do so.
00:03:46
Speaker 2: So the civil.
00:03:47
Speaker 1: Jury heard all this, and a criminal jury is about to hear the same evidence.
00:03:52
Speaker 3: Yeah, so this is a serious She's facing five years for each charge. So depending on how if she's found guilty of these, she could be looking up to forty years behind bars. So this is a serious situation where you've got somebody who, yes, was essentially in charge of a school doctor, Ebene Parker, and now she could be headed to prison. So her life is truly on the line at this point. And this trial they say is expected to last four or five days. We've been watching there's a live stream, and I say live stream going on, but it is delay. There was some back and forth last week about whether or not cameras would even be allowed in this Newport News courtroom, and the judge landed on allowing one camera, a pool camera, to basically document what's going on in that courtroom, but they'll be on a thirty minute delay. So that was the compromise that was made. So this is obviously something that folks all around the country are watching, and certainly school districts. This has far reaching impacts if a school administrator is found criminally responsible for the actions of a student under her care.
00:05:01
Speaker 1: But there's some unique I don't know how often or how much we will see this, but I certainly thought Robes that given where we are and what we've seen, frankly since Columbine, you can go back to that. There's just been a different mindset when it comes to security around schools. You're told a kid has a gun and you don't even open the bag. Is confusing and is a unique situation. I can't imagine, well, if this is a junior high school or a high school, a principle being told, hey, here there's a gun, or you wouldn't immediately go check it out. I don't know if it had, if it played into the mindset of this assistant principle.
00:05:38
Speaker 2: It's a six year old. It's a six year old.
00:05:41
Speaker 1: No, of course, you don't think a six year old would have a gun, but Jesus crime, ay have we not learned a little better? So she's in try on court in court this morningy're supposed to have jury selection and heads up to anybody. As you were just mentioning, the live stream robes is important. The one camera thing and the one the pool camera. We've watched a lot of ty. This one does not have good video or audio. There's one camera angle and the attorney's backs are to you, so you can't see their mouths moving at all to try to match with the audio and the one defense attorney it's kind of soft spoken, so just the heads up is actually hard to follow a little bit, and even the judge is a little soft spoken. So I just want to throw this out there at this crappy audio.
00:06:23
Speaker 3: Yeah, if anyone at home it wants to listen to it and watch these proceedings like we often do. No, just to play off of that you actually had, And we do this oftentimes when we're watching these trials, we have them up on a speaker in the house so we can really try to hear what's going on inside that courtroom. And even with that speaker, it's been difficult to understand exactly what's going on in that courtroom. But we certainly will be following this again four to five days, and there's already an issue. So they say that, but my goodness, if it's starting out this way, who knows how long this will last as the trial continues, But certainly there is so much at stake, and we are expecting by the way, Abby's Werner, the teacher who was shot in this case, and by the way, she's recovered, as we pointed out, with some injuries, but she is expected to testify in this trial as she did in the civil lawsuit, and by all accounts, she is a compelling witness.
00:07:15
Speaker 1: But we don't know when we're going to see her. We don't know how exactly long this trial is going to go. We're told you just said the number of days and what's expected, and that's certainly already. I just met this judge and she is not messing around with time. So jury selection is supposed to get started this morning they are in court. They are alive as we speak. But they started out to address Robes a couple of issues that the attorneys had, one of them being the defense attorney who asked for a continuance.
00:07:45
Speaker 3: Right at the beginning.
00:07:46
Speaker 2: She almost laughed at them.
00:07:47
Speaker 3: She did because look this, by the way, this took place three years ago. The civil lawsuit, as we pointed out, was over with the November. They've had plenty of pre trial hearings, and one as recently as last week. And so the judge said, you have issue, Why are you bringing it up now? You had several opportunities to bring up any sort of issue you had, and now day one of the trial is not the day to bring up this issue.
00:08:11
Speaker 1: I felt bad for him, and it might have been why he was I couldn't hear him because he was a little being a little softer in his requests, because it seemed ridiculous. She talked about, you got the whole We just had a trial, a civil trial. What do you mean all the evidence is over there. They were making an argument this morning that they didn't have a particular piece of police bodycam video. They claim that someone on that bodycam video expressed that they thought the kid's gun was a toy gun. So that the attorney is arguing, you know what, that one little bit of video, we don't have it, we can't find it, and that is exculpatory evidence. We think that could prove she's innocent in this case. We ain't got it, need a continuance to go find it. She said, negro please, And I say that because he is black and she is black as well. Sorry, that's how we talked with each other.
00:08:56
Speaker 2: Sometimes.
00:08:57
Speaker 1: She really looked at him like, are you effing kidding me? After all this time, the video exists, it's out there.
00:09:05
Speaker 2: You know it, you claim you don't have it.
00:09:07
Speaker 1: So he started out first thing this morning, and she already has a group of forty one potential jurors sitting in the back waiting. That's one thing, Robes we've noticed about judges. They hate to waste these people's time.
00:09:19
Speaker 3: Yep. And this woman from the get go looks like she is not going to She made it very very clear where she stands on this, and she does look to be a no nonsense kind of judge. We're learning a lot as we watch all these trials and different judges handle things distinctly, but certainly this woman looks as though she is not going to be taking any sort of delay tactics or anything that's going to, as you point out, waste the jurors time ten minutes.
00:09:44
Speaker 1: I like her already ten minutes of watching her, because she actually agreed with him. She said, you know what, I agree that based on it she gave some case precedent and case law and all this stuff in this case, thought this was excessed. She actually agreed that, yes, that could be entered as something exculpatory. You can make that argument a trial.
00:10:02
Speaker 2: Let's move on.
00:10:03
Speaker 1: Really knock yourself out, but I'm not going to delay this trial once again because you can't find something or claim something that's been used in a trial that went on for months.
00:10:13
Speaker 2: You can't find it.
00:10:14
Speaker 1: Seemed a little don't know if that's the direction they're going to start going, But she wasn't having it, so I appreciate it that very much. So, yes, it seems like rodes this will be a quick trial because of huh.
00:10:24
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly exactly. So as we continue to follow this story and certainly what ends up happening to doctor Ebony Parker over the next coming days. When we come back, we're going to tell you about several other people who have also faced charges or had some sort of fallout based on what happened three years ago in that Newport News classroom. Welcome back, everyone to this episode of Amy and TJ. We are covering the beginning of a hissed trial in Newport News, Virginia. An assistant principal, a former assistant principle, is now being held criminally responsible for her six year old student shooting his first grade teacher. The accusation is that she did not do what she should have done to prevent this shooting. There are at least at least folks will be testifying at least three different times. She was warned, she was told that this six year old student had a loaded gun, and she didn't do what she should have done. She should have checked his bag, she should have searched the student. None of that took place, and a first grade teacher was shot because of it. Now, the boy's mother, I was curious about this Deja Taylor. She is actually currently behind bars. She is serving a four year sentence. She pleaded guilty to state and federal charges. But she and that makes a lot of sense. We have seen parents now being held criminally responsible. You would think that would have to be the case. You can't charge a six year old, and so authorities first and foremost went after his mother.
00:12:02
Speaker 1: Do I have right she was serving for something else? That sentence hasn't even started yet.
00:12:06
Speaker 3: Yes, correct, she had other issues going on which might lead to the situation where you find a child, because that is the big question. How could a six year old? I always describe like that age first graders. They are the sweetest, just sponges. They're absorbing everything, and unfortunately he was absorbing it appears all the wrong things in that house. It was difficult, but several school officials also lost their jobs in this case as well. We know the assistant principal who's now on trial is she resigned almost immediately two weeks after the shooting, but the principal in the school was reassigned. School board voted out the superintendent. There have been some significant fallout In addition, and this makes sense, Newport News Public Schools implemented significant security changes after this. I didn't realize this. Can you imagine just we send sabine to school all student kindergarten through twelfth grade in Newport, News have to use clear backpacks.
00:13:08
Speaker 1: I'm okay with that, or across the country. I don't mind it in at least in the least bit. I have a problem with the yonder pouches that you have to lock your phones up every day. But if you want everybody to walk in clear and eliminate one part of the problem, sure, maybe a kid can put it in his waistband, put it in his pocket, put fine. But I got zero problem with that, and I wish more would address that versus taking the phone away from a kid who might be able to call when there is an emergency. So I'm sorry. There was mo my parenting I got in middle school here, so God. But now I haven't heard anybody else doing that, and I'm okay with it.
00:13:44
Speaker 3: That's the first. I mean, obviously, if you attend any sort of a game in a stadium, a football game, a basketball game, a concert, even, we're kind of used to these clear bags, and that actually makes me feel safe for going into a stadium, going into any large crowd, knowing that everyone's gone through the same checkpoint and certainly only has clear backs. But I had never heard of clear backpacks for students, but that was put into place after this shooting. In addition, there are now weapon detection systems across all middle and high schools in Newport News.
00:14:17
Speaker 1: That's, yeah, fine to be careful, be safe, but you don't want kids to feel like they're going into a prison every time they're going to school, which you also want them to feel safe when they go into school, So there's some balancing act there. But I'm just okay with all these things you're putting in place. There's another system you can put in place that when somebody says the kid has a gun, you go look in the bag. We're doing all this because somebody didn't look in a bag when they were told a gun was in the bag.
00:14:42
Speaker 2: Okay.
00:14:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, and this kid, I mean, by all accounts you were mentioning on that school yard during lunch basically because the shooting happened around two pm. But when they were all out for recess, he was, as you said, showing kids the gun and then telling them if you tell anyone, I'll shoot and kill you. So this was a kid who came in with the mission and just thank goodness that first grade teacher, yeah, not survived.
00:15:03
Speaker 1: Not an accidental shooting. It's part of it. You first hear say, oh my goodness, you brought a gun and something happened. No, no, no, he pulled this thing out with intent, they say, was pulling the trigger. What the actual a six year old? I don't know a six year old I've ever met in my life that I thought was capable of something like that.
00:15:17
Speaker 3: No, and that could possibly be part of her defense, Like, who would ever think a six year old not only would bring a gun, a loaded gun, and then know how to aim and shoot that gun?
00:15:28
Speaker 1: Well, was there an argument, There was some language they were using to watch she wasn't legally responsible, she didn't have that was I kind of remember the But they did have a defense obviously didn't work in the civil trial. But they might be hoping, or at least the teacher is hoping that the assistant principle is found not guilty in the criminal trial. This is wild now that the Virginia was it School Risk Association or share Risk Association. Is this pool of insurers who are the ones on the hook for paying a ten million if the assistant principle is found guilty, they could argue, we don't have any liability. Now because it was actually criminal behavior that caused the incident, we.
00:16:18
Speaker 2: Don't have to pay.
00:16:19
Speaker 3: Wow.
00:16:19
Speaker 1: So the teacher who now won the civil judgment is sitting and maybe hoping this woman is acquitted so she can get a ten million.
00:16:30
Speaker 3: I had not thought of.
00:16:31
Speaker 2: This was called the Virginia.
00:16:33
Speaker 1: Risk Sharing Association, this group of insurers that does it, and they're standing birobes see what happens. I can't imagine the teacher having to look and want civil trial, want her guilty, criminal trial. I want her guilty, but that means I don't get my money.
00:16:47
Speaker 3: Well, she's going to be testifying, so that will be very interesting to see if that plays at all in what she says, how she says it, and what the jury thinks about her testimony. But we will be watching this trial. It will be fascinating and it will be precedent setting. So we always appreciate listening to us. Everyone. I'm Amy Roebuck alongside TJ. Holmes. We will talk to you soon.