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NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — Deja Taylor “abdicated most, if not all” of her responsibilities as a parent when her 6-year-old son got hold of her gun and used it to shoot a teacher at Richneck Elementary School in January, a judge told her Friday.
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The failure was so fundamental that Newport News Circuit Court Judge Christopher Papile said he couldn’t accept the maximum six-month term called for in Taylor’s deal with prosecutors, in which she pleaded guilty to one count of felony child neglect. At her sentencing hearing, he told her he was going to give a stiffer punishment — two years in prison.
“A parent’s ultimate, overarching paramount responsibility is to keep their child safe, to protect their child, to keep them from bad influences, to keep them from dangerous situations, to keep them healthy and nurtured,” Papile said. “Ms. Taylor has abdicated most, if not all, of those responsibilities.”
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He added: “I cannot diminish the severity of the way this child was raised and taken care of from the day he was born.”
Under Virginia law, in imposing sentences, judges are allowed to depart from the terms of plea agreements if they choose. Taylor pleaded guilty to the child neglect charge in August in exchange for prosecutors dropping a gun-related charge.
The sentencing brings to a close the criminal legal proceedings against Taylor, who is already serving a 21-month sentence on federal convictions related to owning the gun while using drugs and lying about her marijuana use during a background check for the purchase of the weapon. She was sentenced on those counts last month and will serve her state and federal terms consecutively.
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Taylor, who appeared in court in a dark blue jail jumpsuit, never spoke at the sentencing. Her attorney pleaded for minimal incarceration, pointing to her significant substance abuse problems and saying she was the victim of domestic abuse.
Mother sentenced to 21 months on federal gun charges in Richneck shooting
Taylor’s son, who prosecutors say will not be charged in the case, took the handgun from his mother’s purse on top of a dresser, before stowing it in his backpack and taking it to his Newport News elementary school on Jan. 6, officials have said. He opened fire on his first-grade teacher, Abigail Zwerner, during class, severely injuring her.
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The shooting captured national attention because of the age of the shooter and stirred anger in Newport News, where teachers and parents complained that the superintendent at the time and other school officials did too little to address violence on local campuses. The superintendent was ousted in the wake of the shooting.
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Zwerner, who has undergone surgeries to repair damage to her hand and chest where the bullet struck her, testified at the sentencing Friday that the experience has had a searing emotional impact on her. She previously said she would not teach again.
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Zwerner, dressed in a black jacket and black pants, testified that she lost consciousness after being shot. Her left lung collapsed. Traces of the bullet are still in her hand and chest. Emergency responders worked to keep her alive.
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“I was not sure whether it would be my final moment on Earth,” she testified.
She said her hand is still giving her trouble and she does not know whether it will return to normal. She has nightmares. She needs medication to sleep. She suffers from PTSD. And she has mounting bills from five surgeries.
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“My life and once-cherished career have been turned completely upside down,” she said. “This would not have happened if not for the defendant’s actions or lack thereof.”
Travis White, one of two Newport News prosecutors who spoke during the hearing, focused on the 227 days that the child required in inpatient treatment after the shooting.
“That is the effect of the neglect Deja Taylor inflicted on her child,” White said.
Chief U.S. District Judge Mark S. Davis said during Taylor’s federal sentencing last month that Taylor had a “really troubling history leading up to this incident.”
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Federal prosecutors alleged in filings that Taylor had fired the handgun used in the Richneck shooting about a month earlier during a dispute with the father of the 6-year-old. No one was hurt in the incident. Prosecutors also wrote that the 6-year-old had taken his mother’s car on two occasions, once crashing it.
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They previously wrote in court filings that investigators found large amounts of marijuana in Taylor’s residences. She failed a handful of drug tests while awaiting sentencing in the federal case. Taylor’s grandfather now has custody of the 6-year-old and has said he is attending a new school.
Zwerner, 26, has filed a $40 million lawsuit against the former superintendent and officials at Richneck, accusing an assistant principal of ignoring multiple warnings that the boy had a gun on the day of the shooting. Ebony Parker, the assistant principal, resigned from her job and has not responded to requests for comment.
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Last month, a Newport News judge ruled that Zwerner can proceed with her lawsuit and can collect more than workers’ compensation if she wins. The school district had hoped to limit any payout.
More charges are possible in the case.
A special grand jury empaneled by Newport News Commonwealth’s Attorney Howard E. Gwynn is still investigating any security lapses that led to the shooting. It’s unclear when the panel might finish the work that began in September and whether it will result in charges or simply a report about the shooting as is allowed under Virginia law.
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