The Killing Of Six-Year-Old Kayla Rolland by a 6-year-old School Shooter.

Kayla Renee Rolland was a six-year-old American girl from Mount Morris Township, Michigan, who was fatally shot by a six-year-old male classmate on February 29, 2000, at Buell Elementary School in the Beecher Community School District. The child found the gun while staying at his uncle's house; the residence was a crack house where guns and drugs were often exchanged.

The Beginning

The killer's father, Dedric Owens, was in jail for violating his parole after earlier being convicted of cocaine possession with intent to deliver and burglary.

The boy had been living with his mother, Tamarla, and his eight-year-old brother. She was evicted from her home because she was unable to pay her rent with the $175 weekly paycheck she received from the two jobs she held, and the two boys were forced to share a single sofa as a bed at their uncle's house.

The boy was known to have behavioral issues, and he was forced to remain after school almost every day for swearing, giving people the finger, pinching, and slapping. He stabbed a girl with a pencil a few weeks before the incident.

He had previously assaulted Kayla Rolland and tried to kiss her the day before her death, but was turned down.

The Tragic Incident

The boy had brought the weapon and a knife to school that day, February 29, 2000. Later that day, during a change of classes, in front of a teacher and 22 students, he fatally shot six-year-old Kayla Rolland while she was climbing the stairs, telling her, "I don't like you," before pulling the trigger.

Her right arm was shot, and the bullet passed through a major artery. Rolland went into cardiac arrest at Hurley Medical Center and was pronounced deceased at 10:29 a.m. EST. After that, he dumped the gun in the garbage and ran to a neighboring bathroom.

Events Following The Murder

Her assailant became the youngest school shooter in the United States, and he was not charged with murder based on the legal justification that at that age, he would lack the ability to develop intent.

Six-year-olds are not responsible for crimes committed in most states in the United States.

The United States Supreme Court ruled in 1893 that "children under the age of seven years could not be guilty of felony, or punished for any capital offense, because the child is conclusively assumed incapable of committing a crime within that age."

Jamelle James, the uncle who owned the .32-caliber revolver used in the shooting, received a prison sentence for concealing the weapon in a shoe box in his bedroom. He subsequently pleaded no contest to involuntary manslaughter and was imprisoned for two years and five months before being released on probation. In the years that followed, the other adults involved would be in and out of court.

A loaded pump-action shotgun and a lump of crack cocaine were discovered during a search of James' home.

The child who shot Kayla Rolland was residing in Bay City, Michigan, according to press reports on the twentieth anniversary of the killing, February 29, 2020. He was convicted of a crime at the age of 18 in connection with allegations of second-degree home invasion and theft at a Bay City home on April 23, 2012.

Buell Elementary School closed in 2002 owing to declining enrollment and financial strain. Arson severely destroyed the campus in 2005, and it was demolished in 2009.

Prior to the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in 2012, Rolland was the youngest school shooting victim in the US, and her assailant is still the youngest person to ever commit a deadly school shooting.