A 9-year-old pupil in Waldorf, Maryland, reaching into a backpack to get a sheet of paper, set off a .357-caliber revolver in the classroom Thursday.
The Billingsley Elementary School student was sitting at a desk at the time of the gunshot, with the backpack between the child’s legs. The bullet shot toward the ground, and no one was injured, the Charles County Sheriff’s Office said on social media.
Authorities didn’t say what grade the student was in, nor did they specify the pupil’s gender.
A school resource officer retrieved the gun after helping the teacher ensure the students in the classroom were safe. CCSO officers are looking into how the student got hold of the gun and why it ended up in the backpack. A preliminary investigation by the officers found that the revolver might belong to a visiting relative of the child.
CCSO didn’t indicate that anyone was criminally charged in connection to the incident.
“We are incredibly thankful and fortunate that no one was injured during today’s incident. I want to take this moment to urge all parents and guardians to have a conversation with their students about the very real dangers of handling or bringing any type of weapon to school,” Charles County Sheriff Troy Berry said in the social media post.
Classes were canceled early as a precaution, Charles County Public Schools Superintendent Maria Navarro said in a release. Billingsley Elementary is also closed Friday “to allow everyone time to process what happened.”
The incident comes just days after a similar one in Spotsylvania County, Virginia. A third grader at Lee Hill Elementary School in Fredericksburg was reaching into a bag for something when a gun went off. No one was injured.
In that case, the pupil’s parents, Terrence Carroll Jr., 34, and Ciara Armstead, 36, were arrested and charged with felony child endangerment and a misdemeanor charge of leaving an unsecured gun out in a way that endangered a child under age 14.
