Kayla Renee Rolland (May 12, 1993 – February 29, 2000) was an American six-year-old girl from Mount Morris Township,

Michigan Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...

, who was fatally shot on February 29, 2000 by a six-year-old male classmate at Buell Elementary School in the Beecher Community School District. The boy had found the gun while living at his uncle's house; the house was a crack house where guns were frequently traded for drugs. The killing drew worldwide attention due to the particularly young ages of the victim and the perpetrator: Rolland was the youngest

school shooting A school shooting is an attack at an educational institution, such as a primary school, secondary school, high school or university, involving the use of firearms. Many school shootings are also categorized as mass shootings due to multiple c ...

victim in the United States until the

Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting occurred on December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut, United States, when 20-year-old Adam Lanza shot and killed 26 people. Twenty of the victims were children between six and seven years old, and t ...

in 2012, and her assailant remains the youngest fatal school shooting perpetrator to date, and the second-youngest school shooting perpetrator in general. The boy was not charged with murder because of his age. Buell Elementary School closed in 2002 and was demolished in 2009.Five years after school shooting, Michigan community still in pain
Sign on San Diego
Retrieved on November 26, 2007

Background

Kayla Rolland was killed by a six-year-old male

first grade First grade (also called Grade One, called ''Year 2'' in England or Primary 2 in Scotland) is the first grade in elementary school and the first school year after kindergarten. Children are usually 6–7 years old in this grade. Examples by ...

r at Buell Elementary School in the Beecher Community School District, located in

Mount Morris Township, Michigan Mount Morris Charter Township is a charter township of Genesee County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 21,501 as of the 2010 census. The city of Mount Morris borders on the east, but the two are administered autonomously. Com ...

, near

Flint Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Flint was widely used historically to make stone tools and sta ...

. His father, Dedric Owens, was in jail for violating his

parole Parole (also known as provisional release or supervised release) is a form of early release of a prison inmate where the prisoner agrees to abide by certain behavioral conditions, including checking-in with their designated parole officers, or ...

, having previously been convicted for possession of

cocaine Cocaine (from , from , ultimately from Quechua: ''kúka'') is a central nervous system (CNS) stimulant mainly used recreationally for its euphoric effects. It is primarily obtained from the leaves of two Coca species native to South Ameri ...

with intent to deliver and burglary.Murder in the First Grad
60 Minutes
/ref> The boy had been living with his mother, Tamarla, and his eight-year-old brother. She was evicted from her home, having been unable to pay rent with the $175 weekly wage she received from the two jobs she worked under

's welfare-to-work program, and both boys then shared a single sofa as a bed at their uncle's house. The home, where his uncle lived with a 19-year-old man, was a crack house where guns were frequently traded for drugs. At some point, the child found a loaded

Davis Industries Davis Industries was a firearms manufacturer established in 1982 by Jim Davis. Davis produced a series of inexpensive handguns, which were sold primarily through pawn shops and marketed towards people with low income. The guns were constructed of ...

P-32 .32-caliber handgun under some blankets.The Killing of Kayl
Time Magazine
The boy was known to have behavioral issues, and was made to stay after school nearly every day for swearing, giving people

the finger In Western culture, "the finger", or the middle finger (as in giving someone the (middle) finger, the bird or flipping someone off) is an obscene hand gesture. The gesture communicates moderate to extreme contempt, and is roughly equivalent i ...

, pinching, and hitting. Some weeks before the shooting he stabbed a girl with a pencil. Chris Boaz, a seven-year-old classmate, claimed the boy once punched him because he would not give him a pickle. The boy had previously attacked Kayla Rolland and, on the day prior to the killing, tried to kiss her and was rebuffed. Early on the day of the shooting, the boy and his brother got into a fight with Boaz's uncle, whom the boy threatened to shoot.

Shooting

On February 29, 2000, the boy had brought the firearm, along with a

knife A knife ( : knives; from Old Norse 'knife, dirk') is a tool or weapon with a cutting edge or blade, usually attached to a handle or hilt. One of the earliest tools used by humanity, knives appeared at least 2.5 million years ago, as evidence ...

, with him to school. During a change of classes, he fatally shot six-year-old Kayla Rolland in the presence of a teacher and 22 students while they were climbing the stairs, saying to her: "I don't like you", before pulling the trigger. The bullet entered her right arm and traveled through a vital

artery An artery (plural arteries) () is a blood vessel in humans and most animals that takes blood away from the heart to one or more parts of the body (tissues, lungs, brain etc.). Most arteries carry oxygenated blood; the two exceptions are the pu ...

. He then threw the handgun into a trash basket and fled to a nearby restroom. He was found there, in the corner, by a teacher and was taken into police custody soon after. At 10:29 a.m. EST, Rolland was pronounced dead at Hurley Medical Center while in

cardiac arrest Cardiac arrest is when the heart suddenly and unexpectedly stops beating. It is a medical emergency that, without immediate medical intervention, will result in sudden cardiac death within minutes. Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and poss ...

. The assailant was held in custody until the Genesee County Family Independence Agency could determine his placement. He and his two younger siblings were later placed with an aunt.More Indictments In School Shootin
CBS News
/ref>

Legal

Her assailant became the youngest school shooter in the United States. Despite Michigan not having a codified age of criminal responsibility he was not charged with any crime based on the legal claim that at that age he would lack the ability to form

intent Intentions are mental states in which the agent commits themselves to a course of action. Having the plan to visit the zoo tomorrow is an example of an intention. The action plan is the ''content'' of the intention while the commitment is the ''a ...

. In most U.S. states, six-year-olds are not liable for crimes they commit, and the Genesee County Prosecutor Arthur Busch called on the citizens to collectively hug the boy, presumably out of pity and sympathy. In an 1893 ruling, the

U.S. Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...

declared that "children under the age of seven years could not be guilty of felony, or punished for any capital offense, for within that age the child is conclusively presumed incapable of committing a crime." This is followed in many U.S. states. Jamelle James, the uncle who owned the .32-caliber pistol used in the shooting, was sentenced for leaving the gun in a shoe box in his bedroom.Sentence in Mich. school shootin
ABC News
/ref> He eventually pleaded no contest to involuntary manslaughter and spent two years and five months in prison before he was released on probation. The other adults involved would be in and out of court systems in the years to follow. A search of James's house produced a loaded

pump-action shotgun Pump action or slide action is a repeating firearm action that is operated manually by moving a sliding handguard on the gun's forestock. When shooting, the sliding forend is pulled rearward to eject any expended cartridge and typically to ...

and a rock of crack cocaine. On the twentieth anniversary of the shooting on February 29, 2020, news media reported that the boy who shot Kayla Rolland was living in

Bay City, Michigan Bay City is a city and county seat of Bay County in the U.S. state of Michigan, located near the base of the Saginaw Bay on Lake Huron. As of the 2010 census, the city's population was 34,932, and it is the principal city of the Bay City Metrop ...

. According to court records, he had been convicted at age 18 of a felony in connection with charges of second-degree home invasion and larceny at a Bay City house on April 23, 2012.

Aftermath

At the time, Kayla Rolland was believed to have been the youngest

victim in United States history, which was not surpassed until the

in December 2012. A day after Rolland's death a shooting spree occurred in Wilkinsburg, Pennsylvania that killed three and injured two others. In response to the Wilkinsburg case, U.S. President

Bill Clinton William Jefferson Clinton ( né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He previously served as governor of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and agai ...

argued for stricter gun laws and mentioned Rolland's case as an example. Buell Elementary closed in 2002 due to dwindling enrollment and stressed finances. The campus was heavily damaged by arson in 2005, and was demolished in 2009.

Depiction in media

Rolland's killing was cited by Michael Moore in his 2002 film ''

Bowling for Columbine ''Bowling for Columbine'' is a 2002 documentary film written, produced, directed, and narrated by Michael Moore. The film explores what Moore suggests are the primary causes for the Columbine High School massacre in 1999 and other acts of gun ...

'', which argued for stricter gun control.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Rolland, Kayla 2000 crimes in the United States 2000 murders in the United States Genesee County, Michigan Murder committed by minors Incidents of violence against girls Deaths by person in Michigan Elementary school shootings in the United States February 2000 events in the United States Violence against women in the United States