Associated Press
PLANT CITY, Fla. — A 6-year-old boy suffered only a bruise and his classmates escaped injury Tuesday when a small handgun in the boy’s pocket went off while he sat in class.
Classes were not interrupted, but about 50 parents took their children home.
The boy, among 10 pupils in a special class at Robinson Elementary School, east of Tampa, for mentally handicapped children, never removed the .22-caliber revolver from his pocket, said sheriff’s spokesman Sgt. Rod Reder.
Reder said the boy suffered a slight bruise on his leg from the discharge.
Reder said he didn’t know if a blank or live round was fired. He said deputies were using metal detectors to try to find a spent bullet.
The boy was being questioned at the school and authorities planned to release him to his mother.
The boy will be suspended for at least 10 days, Hart said. Because he is in special programs protected by the Americans with Disability Act, he will not be expelled under the district’s anti-weapons policy.
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