Arlington high school shooter sentenced to 40 years
ARLINGTON (CBSNewsTexas.com) - The teenage gunman who killed one student and injured another at Lamar High School in March was sentenced to 40 years in prison on Thursday.
The boy cried during closing arguments and it appeared a couple of the jurors may have been crying, too.
The family of Ja'Shawn Poirier, the boy who was killed, was emotional as the verdict was read.
It was before 7 a.m. on March 20 when the shooter, whose identity is withheld because he is a minor, began firing a shotgun outside the school where students had gathered, waiting for the doors to be unlocked. Sixteen-year-old Poirier was killed and a 16-year-old girl was hit in the face by shrapnel.
The teen, who was 15 years old when the shooting took place, admitted he was the shooter.
Assistant District Attorneys Lloyd Whelchel and Lee Sorrells, who prosecuted the case, showed a video of the shooting to the jury.
"Students were terrified," Sorrells said. "There's nothing more terrible or terrifying for a kid than sitting there at school and then getting shot, getting killed. ... He set out to kill someone that day and he did."
The 16-year-old girl who survived the shooting said she was content with the outcome, that this was the consequence the boy earned due to his actions.
The teenage gunman will be sent to the Texas Juvenile Justice Department. The judge will determine whether he should go to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice to serve the remainder of his sentence before he turns 19.