[Metal god]

Negligence is generally a question for a jury. Basically the jury will need to decide, after all the evidence about what took place and what everyone said or did is presented whether the defendant acted as a reasonable and prudent person would in the same situation.

Ordinarily negligence can subject the actor to only civil liability. But extreme forms of "negligence" -- gross negligence, recklessness, or wantonness -- can result in the actor being held criminally liable for any harm he causes.

These sorts of results are highly circumstance dependent. Whether there can be liability will be a matter of exactly what happened and how.

Consider this case from gun-friendly Montana, Estate of Strever v. Cline, 278 Mont. 165 (Mont., 1995), at 174 -- 175 (emphasis added):

These are the very things many believe the school counselor or other officials are them selves responsible for this unfortunate outcome . They had almost the exact same info the parents had to include ( as far as I know ) that the child had access to a firearm based on social media post the student had posted days earlier .

That may not be completely accurate do to the fog of war type of thing . It's been reported the school officials had seen the tweet or what ever it was of the student posting a pic of the firearm on social media . This may have been reported to them right after the shooting and it's simply been reported they knew about it but not said when they knew . To be honest I'm not following that case as close as others right now .