The mother of a six-year-old who shot his teacher in Virginia was sentenced on Friday to two years in prison for child neglect, nearly a year after her son used her gun to critically wound Abby Zwerner.
Friday’s sentencing was the second time Deja Taylor was held to account for the classroom shooting, which shook the military shipbuilding city of Newport News.
Taylor was sentenced in November to 21 months in federal prison for using marijuana while owning a gun, which is illegal under US law. The combination of her state and federal sentences amounts to a total punishment of nearly four years behind bars.
Taylor’s son told authorities he got his mother’s 9mm handgun by climbing onto a drawer to reach the top of a dresser, where the firearm was in his mother’s handbag.
He concealed the weapon in his backpack and then his pocket before shooting his teacher, Abby Zwerner, in front of her year two class.
