Child, 6, brings gun to school (w/video) | Houston & Texas News | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle What was a 6 year old doing with a loaded gun in school. What was a 6 year old doing with a loaded gun anywhere. I don't care if it is an air gun or a firearm, he should never have been able to get hold of it. If he picked it up at home, I do hope the parents are in police custody and facing a prison sentence in due course. If he didn't pick it up at home, where did he get it?

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Kill it, cook it, eat it.

Someone will soon cite the child's 2A rights.

In all seriousness, this illustrates the absolute fact that some people should NOT be allowed to own/possess a gun(s). In the instant case I am speaking of the child's parent/guardian or whomever's gun it was.

Be safe.

911 caller said girl tried to rob market with 'real or fake gun' | detnews.com | The Detroit News

She was just practicing how to do it for when she turned 12.

That gun would not be legal in CA,it failed the drop test.
I am all for optional skills for first responding paramedics to do field neutering of stupid people.

Why doesn't the child have Second Amendment rights? Does the child have freedom of religion? Does the child have the right to freedom of speech? Does a child have the right to due process if they commit a crime?

The answer, in all cases, is "of course they have those rights". The Constitution confers those rights unconditionally. The document's authors assumed that they didn't have to codify into law the obvious responsibilties that go with those rights.

If somebody does cite the child's Second Amendment rights (which, as I read the Constitution, they have), I also hope they cite the responsibility of the parents or guardians to ensure that the child is protected from his own whims. It is improper to attack a person's Constitutional rights without also properly assigning blame for the breakdown in responsibilities that must accompany every right.

In the article, they state that they are investigating how the boy came into possession of the pistol.
Why is it assumed that it was one of the kids parents that allowed access?
What is the back story on this school? is it in an area of gang activity? if so the pieces might start to fit. We cant assume that our culture is a uniform constant everywhere because it isn't
In North Omaha I would not be all that shocked to hear of a kid in a stroller packin an UZI... disappointed .. YEAH but not shocked. I dont assume the culture I live in, and with, has any resemblance to what exists there.
I have a gut feeling that this is one such case of how it done in da hood

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it just needs more voltage

Not all knowing the facts... but after looking at some news videos on the incident... I'd make a highly educated guess that the child picked up the gun from someone who should not legally be in possession of a fire arm.

That may be a major factor in letting a kindergarten child bring a gun to school.

Raven.
Peace,
gordon

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better have that checked

Gentlemen,

I have deleted a few postings and I see some here have already deleted their postings before I got to them.

These discussion threads go a lot smoother if our thoughts and criticisms stay focused on the subject rather than on each other.

phil

We need a law making it illegal for kids to take guns to school...

...oh. Wait...

I'm not sure why my post got deleted. I also didn't know it was one of those over priced $50 Ravens. That explains the going off when dropped part.

I must admit I bought one when I was really poor. It works but I will try not to drop it.

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Shoot fast & live long
Warren

Children do not have the mentioned rights at school. The courts, including the Supreme Court have so ruled many times. The legal reasons that is true is above my pay grade.

Whatever anybody's rights are, how in the world does a six year old get a loaded handgun? Speculation on the child's home is not appropriate here but I bet I can wager a pretty good guess.

Bob

I can speculate as to a few ways a 6YO gets his paws on a piece.
1) found in a sock drawer
2) passed off to the kid by an older punk.
3) discovery of a hastily discarded arm

You know ... the same way WE came into possession of arms at that age. This part really hasnt changed all that much.
what has changed is that we had a better understanding of the care and feeding of arms at that age due to a healthier view of them.

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it just needs more voltage

Read about this in todays paper...Thank God no one was killed...I don't blame the 6yo boy at all and I hope they don't expel him for life...One thing I do know is that if you think as a parent you can hide a hand gun or anything else from a small boy, you are dead wrong...When I was a lad there was no hiding place in the house that I didn't know about and if I had come across a pistol you better believe that I whoul have picked it up and tried to shoot the thing......no doubt about it...

Here's another tedious example of "news" reporting at its scandalous worst --- few facts, no quotes from authorities or functionaries or anyone who has anything insightful to illuminate the incident, just a bunch of irrelevant "reactions" from people who had no first-hand knowledge of the incident, blathering their know-nothing opinions about an incident about which they know nothing.

It's hard to attribute any malevolence to a little kid --- and according to the sketchy account, it was at worst an accidental discharge, not an assault. Tempest in a teapot, inflated by "reporters" into an incident probably worthy of more examination than uninformed commentary.

A person under age 18 may not possess a handgun or handgun ammunition, and it is illegal for a person to provide a handgun or handgun ammunition to a person under age 18, except for target shooting, hunting, or certain other exempted purposes. (Youth Handgun Safety Act, 1994)

No - the parents have the right to select the child's religion.

No - the parents have the right to silence the child if it says something the parents don't like. There are "intervention" services available to enforce these rules by physical force.

Generally no - if they commit a crime at school, the school authorities can punish them with any legal process. If they commit a crime at home, the parents can punish them instead of notifying the police.

Venom, it also how it done in da country. I wuz razed from Appalachia wheer it wuz allrite, yaknowwhaddimean? Weer all about keepin are gunz on us two and we teech the young un's there sekund amendent rites early.

If I had a kid, I'd school him at home where the most dangerous thing he'd have to worry about is a whipp'n!

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Lost it all in a boat accident

According to KTRH-AM, the kid was trying to cock the pistol when it fell to the floor and went off. The make and model were not given, but it was said to be a .380 Automatic.

(BTW KTRH is a news radio station in Houston)

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The Last Standing Knight

Actually, no, it does not. The Constitution, more specifically the first Ten Amendments, recognizes rights which existed prior to the Constitution being drafted. You cannot confer a right, only a privilege.

Some people should not be allowed to own/possess a child!

But seriously (maybe I was being serious), after 2 days no-one has yet told me how or where the child got the gun. Have arrests been made?

jkc is quite right about the lack of facts. He is also right (apparently) about it being an accidental discharge rather than an intended assault. But accidental discharges have got a lot of guys into a lot of trouble in the past. But it was not a tempest in a tea-pot. It was a life threatening incident in which 3 children were injured. It was not inflated by reporters, (with or without quotation marks). It was potentially deadly, and you can't over-inflate that fact. And it was of public interest because children were injured.

Gun Smoke is quite right. Leave something where a child can find it, he will. Leave it where he can't find it, eg a safe with a combination or a keypad, and he can't. I assume the boy had no malicious intentions. He probably just wanted to show it to his friends. He should probably suffer no more than a severe telling off. But someone must be answerable for this. Venomballistics suggests several possibilities as to how the boy got the gun. Tricky one, but I suspect .... But I may be wrong.

I only read 2 reports, one on the BBC website and the one I showed in my original posting. I don't think either report was unreasonable. They simply reported the facts as they were known at the time without any speculation. It is the function of reporters to bring the news to us. Maybe no-one in authority was prepared to make a statement, but that doesn't mean that the news shouldn't be reported.

I won't attempt to intervene in your discussion on 2nd amendment rights. That's an American thing, and I am English.

I can't understand why a serious subject like this should lead to postings being deleted. I hope no-one said anything nasty about me. I raised a very serious issue. All I expected was serious concern, and serious replies.

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Kill it, cook it, eat it.

yup .. its a concern .. though one I feel is a bit misplaced.
the concern, as I see it, isnt so much that a kid gets their paws on a gun. this has happened since after it was invested im sure.
sometimes it ended badly, but most times it didn't because, unlike now, kids knew what to do with arms to some degree by that age.
Its rare you will find a kid of that age today that even knows what a gun range looks like, let alone had our fine father to son tradition passed down to him.
theirs safety in knowledge of arms, and when all else fails, its that knowledge that keeps em on this side of the turf.
Your gun safe is only good for as long as it takes junior to figure out how to use your torch, saber saw, or grinder to defeat it.

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it just needs more voltage

Still don't know any hard facts on how and where he got the gun. Anyone heard more about it?

The Last Standing Knight says a radio station said the boy was trying to cock the gun when it went off. If that is true, it was not quite the accident it was made out to be. If he had succeeded in cocking it, what next?

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Kill it, cook it, eat it.

It is a shame to me most children nowadays haven't had a parent or two spending the time they should with things like that, as I was fortunate enough to have when young. On the other side of the coin, parents have more visible reason to keep their weapons in safe locations and their children knowledgeable in regards to their safety and apparent "no touch" zones.

I think this is a rare situation and refuse to make a judgment call on it. Glad nobody was hurt.

Among other things, I was a school principal for about fourteen years...in my previous life.

At this one small town, rural elementary school with about 450 students, I had two "gun" incidents in six years.

First incident, teacher comes into to office with "Little Johnnie" in tow, telling me Little Johnnie has something to show me!. At first I just kind of pooped it off in that I was busy at the time.

Well, Little Johnnie proceeds to pull a .32 cal, break action, Iver Johnson, "sucicide special" out of his pocket. He was having his own "show and tell" out on the playground.

Now this kid just picked up this cheap gun at home, brought it to school to show his buddies. The gun was not loaded and he was not making any threats.

The superintendent called the cops, Little Johnnie was cuffed up and did the perp walk down the hall to the cop car. He never came back to school. He was seven years old in the second grade and was a "problem" student.

Next incident, student catches me in the hallway before school and tells me that "Little Bob" has a gun.

At the word "gun", my secretary starts clearing the hall of students, and has the superintendent who was right next door on the phone pronto.

I proceed toward the classroom where Little Bob was, and he darts from the room and runs towards his locker with me in pursuit. He grabs a coat from the locker and clutches it to his chest and trembles in anticipation. I ask him what's in the coat to which he replies, "nothing"! Well, I reach out, grab the coat and feel the gun in a pocket. I retrived the gun and it was a cheap, .32 ACP semi-auto like a Lorcin, with a full mag and one in the chamber....cocked.

I retrived the gun, escorted Little Bob to the office and the cops are there pronto again.

Little Bob was cuffed up and did the perp walk down the hall out of the school. He was suspended for one year but never did come back. Little Bob was in the fifth grade and was a "pain in the *** kid."

Again, he was not making any threats, etc. but had it out on the play ground and was loading the magazine, putting it in the gun and them chambering a round. Actually, Little Bob was more than a pain in the ***, he was a certifiable whack job.

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G.P. Charlie

Read the article again. At best, no one was killed.

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In dog years I'm dead.

Not much interest over here as it seems the 3 kids could have been treated by the school nurse and sent back to class. Looks like the ambulances, police lines, lockdowns and grief counselors were a bit of a overreaction by the school. Maybe can the hysterics next time?

Bob

The local Houston ABC station has identified the gun as a "semiautomatic 9 mm Kel-Tec" and stated, as mentioned before, that the boy was trying to cock it.

From the article......
"He was actually pulling the gun out and showing it, and he was working on sliding it," Capt. Lori Bender said.

Quoting Capt. Bender, "The boy's finger then got caught and the gun went off. That surprised the boy, so he dropped the gun and it went off again, wounding the three students".

Amazing!

Reuters also reported that Capt Lori Bender of the Houston Police described the gun as a Kel-Tec 9mm and that it belongs to a family friend. The boy with the gun has undergone two operations for his injuries.

Doesn't quite fit in with:



So it seems he did bring it from home or from a friend's home. With friend's like that, who needs enemies?

The story slowly unfolds. If such an incident happened in France there would be public uproar, and arrests would have been made.

If it had happened in England when Tony Blair was Prime Minister, he would have banned children from schools. He had already banned handguns. But he was a socialist millionaire with an ugly wife and a silly grin.

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Kill it, cook it, eat it.

The above "Doesn't quite fit in"

Could be, but that had not been reported. The only thing reported was that the Capt said the gun belonged to a family friend. How and where the boy got the gun wasn't determined and was still under investigation at the time of the story as reported.

Kindergarten boy was showing off gun when it fired - 92.1 Big Country

Had the report been: "Kindergartner Brings Chainsaw To Show And Tell," or, "brings lawn mower fuel and matches" to school, this incident would not have garnered the amount of interest it has, which is out of all proportion to it's seriousness, only because there was a gun involved. In their desire to inflate the "newsworthiness" of an otherwise unimportant occurrence, reporters seized on the presence of the gun as the focal point of the story. Had the kid doused his lunchroom classmates with lawnmower fuel and tossed in a match, I doubt we'd have seen it much mentioned other than locally...

The "two operations" on the boy is unsubstantiated from a very poor source(Houston police, who frankly should not even have access to that type of information according to the law) and reported only by Reuters AFAIK.

If anybody has seen new information on this shooting and the aftermath it sure would be nice to see it.

Bob

Also in the same report a spokesman for Children's Hospital said the boy was still in the hospital on Thursday. I think the incident happened on Tuesday.

What source were you relying on that the boy could have been treated by the school nurse and sent back to class?

Edit: Quibbling over details really isn't of much interest to me, but rather how we read things, fill in the blanks, and come to different conclusions.