A Virginia schoolteacher who was shot by her six-year-old student in 2023 has been awarded $10m in damages by a jury, concluding a negligence lawsuit she brought against a school administrator.
Abigail Zwerner alleged that an assistant principal at the Newport News elementary school, where she used to teach, ignored multiple reports that a gun was on school property and probably in the possession of the boy who shot her in January 2023.
Police said the boy had taken the 9mm handgun from his home and carried it to school in his backpack. The boy removed the gun once in his classroom and fired a single bullet at Zwerner, hitting her in her hand and chest. Zwerner, who evacuated students from her classroom even after she was shot, has had five hand operations and still has a bullet lodged in her chest.
Lawyers for Ebony Parker, the former assistant principal at Richneck elementary, where the shooting took place, argued during the trial that she could not have foreseen the shooting.
Zwerner’s complaint, which sought $40m in damages, claimed that Parker acted with gross negligence and in “reckless disregard” for Zwerner’s safety and that the teacher continues to suffer pain and emotional distress over the shooting.
Zwerner’s lawyers argued that Parker had been made aware of reports by fellow students that the six-year-old boy had brought a gun to school, and that she did not act quickly on that information.
The case stemmed from an incident on 6 January 2023. Zwerner had been seated at a table during a first-grade reading class when the student drew a handgun from his front hoodie pocket and fired the round. The gun, with six bullets left in the magazine, then jammed.
During the trial, attorneys for Zwerner said Parker ignored clear warning signs that the boy had a gun. Trial testimony included assertions that three first-grade students reported that the boy had a weapon – two girls saying it was in his bag and third student reportedly telling a teacher that he showed him a gun during break.
“The road signs were screaming at her, flashing at her, telling her what was going to happen if she did not act,” Kevin Biniazan, one of Zwerner’s attorneys, said of Parker in court. “She blew past the signs.”
Attorneys for Parker said other teachers and staff could have done more and insisted blame should not fall on their client. Sandra Douglas, one of Parker’s lawyers, asked the jurors to look at the case using “real-time judgments, not hindsight judgments”.
“It was unforeseeable,” Douglas said, according to testimony record by the Daily Press in Newport News. “It was unthinkable. And it was unprecedented.”
After the ruling, attorneys for Zwerner said they were “very happy with the outcome”.
One of Zwerner’s attorneys told ABC News that Parker was insured under an insurance policy for the Newport News school board, but that is subject to post-trial motions.
Parker faces a criminal trial next month on charges of child abuse and neglect. Deja Taylor, the mother of the boy who carried out the shooting, was sentenced to 21 months in prison in 2023 on federal charges of possessing a gun while using a controlled substance and of making a false statement while purchasing a gun.
Taylor’s son told authorities he obtained his mother’s gun by climbing on to a drawer to reach the top of a dresser, where the firearm was in her purse. His mother reportedly told investigators the gun was secured with a trigger lock. Investigators said they never found one.
The trials, along with those of a handful of parents of school shooters in recent years, could set a precedent on the degree of responsibility that parents and school leaders have when it comes to school shootings, which have plagued the United States in recent decades.
Reuters contributed to this report
