Another example of stupidity in the world at large today:
“A Hempfield Area High School sophomore spent 12 days in juvenile detention after authorities in Westmoreland County mistakenly charged him with making a March 11 bomb threat, in part because the district had not changed its clocks to reflect daylight-saving time.
“Cody Webb, 15, of Hempfield, was arrested March 12 and charged with a felony count of threatening to use weapons of mass destruction and misdemeanor counts of making false alarms to public entities, reckless endangerment, disorderly conduct and making terrorist threats.”
I particularly like the “threatening to use weapons of mass destruction” charge. The term WMD seems to cover a huge range of potential weapons in the US these days post-Saddam. Definition anyone?
Full article link.
My least favourite part is what the school prinicipal is alleged to have said,
“Webb gave an insight into the school’s impressive investigative techniques, saying that he was ushered in to see the principal, Kathy Charlton. She asked him what his phone number was, and, according to Webb, when he replied ‘she started waving her hands in the air and saying “we got him, we got him.‒
‘They just started flipping out, saying I made a bomb threat to the school,’ he told local television station KDKA. After he protested his innocence, Webb says that the principal said: ‘Well, why should we believe you? You’re a criminal. Criminals lie all the time.’ ”
This sounds similar to the reasons for detaining people indefinitely without charge at Guantanamo.
Article link.
Oops. I didn’t mean to get all political there.
Comments
One response to “Boy Locked Up For School’s Error”
It is sad the way we Americans are scared these days. I suppose the entire world is wary. I see my public schools, my police departments, my airports, and the everyday Joe more interested in catching a perpetrator than catching “the” perpetrator.
Still, I can easily justify their reactions with my own fear. One morning I walked into my high school. I was the first one there. I saw the glass on the doors had been broken. “Die!” was spray painted in the hallways, and “tick tock tick tock” was sprawled across the cafeteria walls. We didn’t have school that day. They crowded us into the tennis courts. Hundreds of students locked in a wire gate 100 feet from the building.
When we are consumed with fear and anger it is impossible to make a plan. Without a plan we may, and indeed have, pointed our fingers at the next moving thing. We cannot capture and control the hate that spurs these acts on, and I believe our feelings of helplessness have bred a hapless pursuit of justice.
The trouble is, seeing this does nothing to relieve my worried thoughts. Quite the opposite, this knowledge amplifies the anxiety in my heart.
(My goodness, I did go on.)