NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — A special grand jury appointed in the Richneck Elementary School shooting case will investigate whether any “actions or omissions” by school system employees led to a 6-year-old boy opening fire on his first grade teacher in a classroom three months ago.
A news release from the Newport News commonwealth’s attorney’s office Monday was vague on the investigation’s target, saying the special grand jury would be asked to look into any “security issues” surrounding the Jan. 6 shooting.
But the petition for the special grand jury’s appointment — publicly released Tuesday morning — makes clear the newly launched probe will focus on “current or former employees of the Newport News Public School System.”
“An investigation is warranted,” the prosecution’s petition says, “to determine ... the full scope of any criminal activity,” the “circumstances surrounding such activity,” and “to charge those persons who are criminally responsible for such acts or omissions.”
Moreover, the special grand jury will be asked “to make other recommendations as necessary to remedy those security failures in the hopes that such a situation never occurs again.”
The petition for the special grand jury from Newport News’ top prosecutor, Commonwealth’s Attorney Howard Gwynn, came three months after the first grader shot his teacher, 25-year-old Abby Zwerner, in a classroom, leading to headlines around the nation and world.
The petition was filed the same day a regular grand jury indicted the boy’s mother, Deja Nicole Taylor, 25, with felony child neglect and a misdemeanor count of recklessly leaving a loaded firearm so as to endanger the life of a child.
Circuit Judge Bryant L. Sugg agreed to Gwynn’s petition, signing the order Monday afternoon forming the grand jury and impaneling 11 pre-selected citizens to serve on it. The jurors will serve for six months from Monday, though that time frame can be extended by court order.
“The special grand jury shall investigate and report on any condition that involves or tends to promote criminal activity, and shall consider bills of indictment related to such activity,” Sugg’s order said, mirroring language in the section of law pertaining to special grand juries.
Sugg appointed four prosecutors to serve as the panel’s counsel during the investigation: Gwynn, Deputy Commonwealth’s Attorneys Valerie Muth and Travis White, and Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Joshua Jenkins.
Those prosecutors “shall be permitted to make notes and to duplicate portions of the evidence as they deem necessary for use in a criminal investigation or proceeding,” the order says. Any evidence gathered by the special grand jury will be maintained by the commonwealth’s attorney’s office.
As the 6-year-old student boy sat at his desk at 2 p.m. on Jan. 6, he suddenly pulled a gun out of his front hoodie pocket, pointed it at Zwerner — seated at a reading table less than 10 feet away — and fired a single round.
The bullet went through Zwerner’s left hand — which she held up as the boy opened fire — and then struck her in the upper chest and shoulder, where it remains today.
Zwerner managed to shuttle about 18 students out of the first grade classroom before seeking help at a school office. She was released from the hospital about 10 days later.
Richneck’s assistant principal at the time, Ebony Parker, has come under intense criticism, including in a $40 million lawsuit by Zwerner’s attorneys. They contend she ignored several stark warnings that the 6-year-old boy had a gun in school on Jan. 6, including another student telling a teacher that the boy showed him the gun during recess.
The Daily Press has been unable to reach Parker in recent weeks.
Also named in the Zwerner lawsuit are the Newport News School Board; Richneck’s former principal, Briana Foster-Newton, who has been shifted to another job with the school division; and former Superintendent George Parker III — no relation to the assistant principal — whom the board fired about three weeks after the shooting.
An attorney for Foster-Newton said the principal wasn’t told until after the shooting about the reports of the boy having a gun at the school.
The former superintendent, for his part, has wished well on Zwerner, the 6-year-old, and the school system. “I hope that everyone can continue to move forward and make sure accountability is put in the right place,” George Parker told the Daily Press last week.
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