A 6-year-old boy carried a loaded AR pistol onto a school bus in Richland County on Tuesday morning, and it was a fellow student who noticed and spoke up, allowing staff to seize the weapon before anyone was hurt. His mother, 35-year-old Destar Hall, was arrested and charged with unlawful conduct toward a child after authorities say she failed to secure the firearm at her home.
According to the WYFF, the child gained possession of the gun at home before boarding the bus. Another student on the bus alerted authorities after seeing the six-year-old holding the firearm, which allowed school administrators to immediately retrieve it and hand it off to the school resource officer, as reported by WLTX. The Richland County Sheriff's Department said the resource officer at J.P. Thomas Elementary School was called to the scene around 7:30 a.m. on Tuesday, once the gun had already been found.
Classmate's Warning Averts Disaster
Richland County School District One Superintendent Dr. Todd Walker said the child's classmate successfully followed the district's “see something, say something” protocol, which is what allowed staff to intervene before anyone was harmed or placed in imminent danger, per the same WLTX account. District officials commended the quick response from students and staff alike.
The weapon itself has drawn scrutiny. WLTX reports that authorities described it as an AR pistol chambered in .556 rounds, and a local firearms expert from Palmetto State Armory who examined photos of the recovered gun noted it appeared to be a custom-built firearm rather than an off-the-shelf factory model. AR pistols function similarly to rifles but are classified under federal law as handguns.
Second Weapon Found at Nearby High School Same Morning
The J.P. Thomas incident was not the only school gun case reported in Richland County that morning. Per WIS TV, Richland County deputies also arrested a 16-year-old student at Richland Northeast High School, in neighboring Richland School District Two, after private security discovered a gun with a loaded 17-round magazine inside his backpack at a school metal detector. The two cases were unrelated but happened within hours of each other across the same county's school system.
J.P. Thomas Elementary sits north of Columbia near Interstate 20 and Fairfield Road and serves more than 300 students within Richland County School District One, according to the Post and Courier. That outlet also reported that Richland County Sheriff's Department records indicate Hall had prior arrest records in the county before this latest arrest. Hall was booked into the Alvin S. Glenn Detention Center to await a bond hearing.
Felony Charge Reflects Gap in State Storage Law
Hall's charge, unlawful conduct toward a child under South Carolina Code § 63-5-70, is a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison for a parent or guardian who places a child at unreasonable risk of harm, according to the University of South Carolina School of Law. South Carolina does not have a dedicated gun safe-storage or child-access prevention statute, which is why prosecutors lean on that broader child endangerment law when minors get hold of unsecured household firearms, per Everytown Research & Policy. Several bills proposing mandatory safe storage have been introduced in the state legislature but have not become law.
The gap has drawn official attention before. In March, South Carolina Department of Public Health officials and Columbia police issued public safety guidance urging parents to lock up firearms and store them separately from ammunition, following a string of incidents in which young children accessed unsecured weapons, WLTX reported at the time. State health officials stressed that simply hiding a gun is not enough to keep a child from finding it.
Charging a parent after a young child brings a gun to school is not unique to South Carolina. In August 2023, a Virginia mother pleaded guilty to felony child neglect after her 6-year-old son used her handgun to shoot a teacher in Newport News, a case that drew national attention to parental responsibility for firearm security, according to PBS News.
