Lost Innocence In Montana

Almost five years ago in Butte, Montana, as scores of kids lined up for elementary school, Superintendent Kate Stetzner frantically phoned police as a 10-year-old boy with a handgun opened fire, reports CBS News Correspondent Jerry Bowen.

Eleven-year-old Jeremy Bullock was killed in the gunfire, but he was not the intended victim. That was another boy who had been teasing the 10-year-old shooter because his parents had AIDS.

"I had the little boy who had done the shooting on one arm here, and I had the little boy who he was going to shoot on this arm," Stetzner remembers. "I kept saying to him, 'Sweetheart, why did you shoot him?' And he said, 'Because he's mean to me, and I don't like him, and I decided that I was going to shoot him'."

The shooting stunned the historic mining town, changing the way people look at life. Sixteen-year-old Jesse van Deveer was in the line of fire that day.

"No one ever thought a small place like this, anything like that would happen," he says. "And now you just wonder, because you never know when it is going to happen."

It was Robin and Bill Bullock's son who was killed, and they say the road away from grief is endless.

"There isn't a day that goes by when we don't miss Jeremy, talk about Jeremy, still grieve for Jeremy," says father Bill.

Next to the school, there's a huge soccer field built by volunteers in Jeremy's memory. And each year, there's a march against school violence.

Subsequently, there is also more help for troubled kids. Even the fire marshal was summoned to counsel a boy who started a fire at home.

More than five years after Butte lost its innocence, educators, social workers, and safety experts have reached the sobering conclusion that even with all they're doing, there are no guarantees it won't happen again.

"We can't tell people there are safe schools," says school principal Paula Lynch. "We can do our best to try and make them as safe as possible."

When Jeremy Bullock was murdered, he left behind a twin brother and three younger siblings. Years later, he is still part of their daily lives.

"Every morning, we say good morning to all five children. Every night, we say good night to all five children," says mother Robin.

While the young killer resides in a foster home under court supervision, both his parents have died of AIDS. And he remains the youngest schoolyard shooter in American history.