Speaking of the Saugus High School shooting, because we were, the parents of the children killed have filed another lawsuit. Previously, the parents of Gracie Anne Muehlberger and Dominic Blackwell sued the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives claiming that the ATF refused to regulate ghost guns. If you’ll recall, the shooter Nathaniel Berhow, used a gun that was assembled from various parts that could have been purchased from different vendors. While these guns are unregistered, they’re not exactly illegal.
More recently, the parents of Gracie Anne Muehlberger and Dominic Blackwell have filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the William S. Hart Union High School District which includes Saugus High School. The parents claim that shooter Nathaniel Berhow was allowed to remain unsupervised in the school quad area for 45 minutes prior to the shooting. According to the suit, Berhow was supposed to have been in class at the time and no school faculty member intervened.
In addition to that, the suit alleges that not only was the school’s tip line inoperable but the school’s outdoor security cameras had their view obscured by overgrown trees and were not actively monitored.
Usually, when a school is sued after a shooting, I don’t think the suits can stand on their own merit. In most cases, there wasn’t a lot that the schools could have done to prevent the shooting. In this case, however, I think the suit does have merit.
With the shooter having taken his own life, this may be the only avenue of justice for the families of the victims. And even though the DA refused to file charges against the shooter’s mother for not securing these ghost guns that were found in the home, I imagine the victims’ families will eventually file a wrongful death lawsuit against her as well.
