A father whose 14-year-old son brought the older man’s gun to school in Chula Vista was sentenced Thursday to 240 days in custody, which after 30 days in jail can be served in an electronic monitoring program.
Zachariah Dow, 37, pleaded guilty in July to child abuse, being a felon in possession of a firearm and possession of ammunition by a felon. He was placed on four years probation.
Dow surrendered to authorities the night of May 21, about seven hours after the gun scare at Hilltop High. An assistant principal made an emergency call late in the morning after several students reported seeing a ninth-grader displaying a handgun in class.
Chula Vista police said students claimed that the suspect made statements that the gun was loaded and that he could potentially use it to shoot someone at school.
Officers went to the boy’s classroom and arrested him without incident. Inside the boy’s backpack was a loaded .44-caliber revolver, police said.
Friends of the boy said he had been bullied at school.
Detectives later determined that the gun belonged to Dow, the boy’s father.
— City News Service