In 1997 a fourteen-year-old freshman called Michael Carneal took four guns to his school in Paducah, Kentucky. Armed with 600 rounds of ammunition he pointed a pistol at a student prayer group and opened fire. Three students would die and five others would be injured. One of them was Missy Jenkins.
Today Missy Jenkins is confined to a wheelchair - paralyzed from the chest down just because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. The shooting at Paducah’s Heath High sent shock waves throughout the country drawing nationwide attention to the severe consequences of bullying, thought to be the trigger that ignited Carneal’s murderous rampage.
Missy, now accustomed to her wheelchair, has somehow found peace and forgiveness for Michael Carneal. But others such as Bill Bond – Heath High’s principal at the time of the shooting, have not been able to forgive and forget the deaths of three innocent young people.
At age 14, Carneal was tried in court as an adult and is currently serving a life sentence for his killing spree.
