The mother of a 6-year-old who was accused of shooting his first-grade teacher earlier this year has come out to accept responsibility for her child’s actions, stating that his actions were linked to an ADHD diagnosis.
“I am, as a parent, obviously willing to take responsibility for him because he can’t take responsibility,” Deja Taylor told ABC News.
Prosecutors say Taylor is charged with a felony count of child neglect and a misdemeanor count of recklessly leaving a firearm to endanger a child. She is expected to appear in court in August.
Taylor’s son’s teacher, Abby Zwerner, is expected to make a full recovery from the shooting and has filed a $40 million lawsuit in April against the Newport News School District and Richneck Elementary. In court documents, she claims the institutions ignored her repeated warnings about the child’s behavior in addition to her cautioning them that the child may have a gun.
The school’s board legal team has filed a motion to have the suit dismissed, stating her injuries are covered under worker’s compensation. Zwerner has declined to receive benefits.
Meanwhile, Taylor says her son is a “great kid,” but “very energetic” due to his ADHD. “He’s off the wall. Doesn’t sit still, ever,” she said.
“You know, most children, when they are trying to talk to you, and if you easily just brush them off, or you ask them to sit down, or you’re dealing with something else and you ask them to go and sit down, at 6 [years old] you — in your mind would believe that, ‘Somebody’s not listening to me,’ and you have a tantrum,” Taylor added.
The day the shooting took place, the student had just returned from a suspension, according to court documents. Taylor’s attorney, James Ellenson, claims the school is ultimately responsible for the shooting since they prematurely enrolled him in first grade knowing he only attended two months of kindergarten and two months of pre-K.
“If they believed all of these behaviors to be true, then they should not have allowed him” to advance to a higher level, Ellenson said. “They should’ve put him back into kindergarten, possibly even pre-K, but at the minimum to kindergarten.”
The student is currently in the legal custody of Calvin Taylor, who said the child has since left the school and is now in therapy.
“I just don’t think the constant negativity [from] my community is allowing this to boil over,” he told ABC News. His mother, he said, should not be condemned for her actions, but must be looked at “as a human being who made a mistake.”
