Newly released police body camera footage has captured the disturbing moments following a January 2023 school shooting in Newport News, Virginia, showing a 6-year-old boy cursing at officers and daring them to arrest him after he shot his first-grade teacher inside Richneck Elementary School.
In the footage, the child can be heard telling responding officers he had no fear of consequences. “I don’t care if you call backup. I don’t care if I go to jail,” the boy says in the video. At another point he screams profanity at multiple officers and challenges them physically.
The child also admitted during the encounter that the gun belonged to his mother and that he had taken it without her knowledge. A teacher at the scene was restraining the boy while officers noted he still had gunshot residue on his hands.
The shooting left teacher Abigail Zwerner with a bullet wound that passed through her hand before lodging in her chest. Doctors have since determined that surgically removing the bullet poses a greater risk to her health than leaving it in place. Zwerner testified at a subsequent civil trial that she believed she was dying after being shot.
The video had been sealed during the criminal trial of former assistant principal Ebony Parker who faced eight counts of child neglect. Prosecutors argued Parker had received multiple warnings that the child was carrying a firearm in his backpack on the day of the shooting and failed to act. A judge dismissed all charges against Parker in May ruling her actions did not constitute a crime under Virginia law. That same judge later ordered the footage released with the child’s face digitally obscured.
A civil jury found Parker’s gross negligence directly contributed to the shooting and awarded Zwerner $10 million in damages plus interest. Zwerner no longer works as a teacher following the traumatic incident.
The boy’s mother Deja Taylor faced both state and federal charges stemming from her son’s access to her firearm. In December 2023 she was sentenced to two years in prison on a state felony child neglect charge and 21 months on a separate federal weapons charge related to the case.
The release of the body camera footage has reignited national debate over child access to firearms and school safety protocols. The case remains one of the most alarming examples of gun violence inside an American classroom in recent memory given the age of the child involved.