This Illinois mother might have saved several lives when she called the police on her 18-year-old son Derek Burton. Burton, according to his mother, had been suicidal and threatened to shoot up his school after a fight with his girlfriend. Marshanice Mackey made the decision to call the police at 1 a.m. on Wednesday, May 23 after her son fled her home.

At the time, she noticed her gun was missing.

As a result of Mackey’s call, classes were canceled at two local high schools in Belleville, Illinois. Burton was arrested hours later, outside of his girlfriend’s home. He was charged with three counts of aggravated assault, aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, one count of unlawful use of a weapon, one count of threat and one count of a threat against a school or person.

When he was arrested, Burton was unarmed.

According to KMOV, the missing gun was later found at her home. Police believe Burton returned the weapon and left again but his mother did not know he’d returned it.

Mackey said that despite her son’s actions, he’s a good kid. “He’s not a bad kid, he’s done something and he’s made a mistake.”

While Mackey admitted that the decision she made was a hard one, she doesn’t regret her decision and believes more school shootings could be prevented if more parents act.

“You know, that’s why we have a lot of school shootings,” she told KSDK. “Because a lot of parents don’t agree that we need to set certain structures for their children, or, ‘That’s my son so I’m not going to call the police on them because I don’t want them to get caught up in the system,’ let that happen. That’s not going to be the case with me.”