Posted on 11/22/2019 4:50:57 AM PST by karpov
Authorities arrested a 14-year-old white male student at Naperville High School in Naperville, Illinois, and charged him with committing a hate crime.
What the teen did was genuinely bad: He took a picture of a black classmate and posted a "slave for sale" ad on Craigslist. The school suspended him, and it was right to do so.
But now the police are involved, and the teen faces two felony hate crime charges as well as a misdemeanor disorderly conduct charge.
...
For the authorities to charge someone with a hate crime, there must be an underling crime. Simply holding or expressing hateful views is not illegal—indeed, it is protected by the First Amendment. Prosecutors can consider hate crime charges only when hate is the motivating factor in the commission of a crime, such as assault or vandalism.
Since disorderly conduct is the only other item here, the hate crime charges presumably stem from that. Disorderly conduct is often a broad category of offense, and such is certainly the case under Illinois law: "A person commits disorderly conduct when he or she knowingly does any act in such unreasonable matter as to alarm or disturb another and to provoke a breach of the peace." The disorderly conduct charge is a misdemeanor, but the hate crime charges are felonies, making this an extremely serious criminal matter for a 14-year-old kid.
I don't know what was going through his head when he posted the Craigslist ad—news article suggest the two boys were former friends—and I do not object at all to the school itself taking punitive action. But should the cops really be arresting 14-year-olds, and subjecting them to life-derailing felony charges, for incidents of nonviolent bullying?
(Excerpt) Read more at reason.com ...
I never said that a hate crime was involved, but a crime very well may have occurred and a civil suit is on the way.
“ What injuries were suffered?”
That’s a question for the victim.
Our actions have consequences not all of them legal. We need to think twice before we do something stupid.
She came off as very sympathetic and truthful IMO. I saw two of those interviews while at my GF's house last night (don't have TV at home.)
Normally I have a pretty good BS detector, in this case I wasn't getting the impression she was lawsuit happy. Time will tell.
I will say this: as I work in Naperville and many of the people I work with also live in/around Naperville, there is very little if any compassion for the kid who placed the Craigs List ad. "Stupid" is the word most commonly used to describe him. Usually preceded by the F-word.
So what is the appropriate punishment for a very bad, tasteless joke like this for a 14 year old?
Felony? Drawing and quartering? Head on a pike?
You mean aside from the young black man being verbally and mildly assaulted at school and the family home being vandalized?
The original story did. The kid has been charged with committing a hate crime.
[[[Everybody knows that the best way to sell slaves is at public auction.]]]
Winner, winner, chicken dinner!
Craigslist should have just pulled the ad. The kid should have been called an assh@le. Issue resolved.
” I can understand the police getting involved, I do not understand where the school has the ability to suspend the perp in this case since the actions he took were OUTSIDE of school property and not on school time.
That part I don’t understand.”
Taken in the context of almost all schools nowadays require students to sign code of conduct pledges and behavioral pledges (again, most of which include items like cyber bullying of another student and other non-school property/hours related offenses), then it stands to reason these are the grounds on which the school has taken disciplinary action regarding this incident.
Agree or disagree, but that’s what I would think is going on in this instance.
Charging him with a felony hate crime is (IMO) designed to drive the family into bankruptcy vis a vis having to defend him in court and likely drive them out of Naperville.
I live in the area. I know what I'm talking about and you all here on FR aren't getting the whole story through this Reason Mag article.
The young man that was targeted in the CL ad has been harassed and bullied at school, mildly physically assaulted at school by several of the perp's friends and the family home was vandalized. These are things that aren't being reported in the national media or this article.
None of this makes charging the perp with a felony hate crime right (IMO) it does mean anyone who acts out because of what this stupid perp did should also be held accountable.
Felony hate crime laws = thought crimes. I'm against legally punishing people for what they think.
I am for punishing people for what they actually do as I think we all are.
Frankly, that's stupid and lawsuits have proven they don't hold up in court. Schools in no way should ever have the ability to punish kids for what they do in their own time.
Schools exist for one purpose: education. Anything else is out of their purview.
He can still become Governor of Virginia, but only if he’s a Democrat.
We agree. What happened to his family is not right.
I’m just concerned that, if another event like this happens (just the posting on Craigslist, not the other stuff), that charging w/ hate crime is using a sledgehammer to kill a fly.
It is a fundamental right to be an ass and even this level of friend-on-former-friend dynamic rises to the level of crime nowhere. When it does, we have a BIG problem.
Yep. That sounds about right. Nailed it.
I think what another poster above said was right: CL should've pulled the ad and the kid who posted it should've been called an asshole. Case closed.
The terms you mentioned are pejoratives and are intended to be insults when directed at the target[s]. And no, they are not considered to be racists. Because those individuals or individual these terms are directed toward are not considered human in the view of those hurling these words. These words are designed to isolate, define,identify, and mark for later destruction their targets by those who employ them.
The National Socialists had their term[s]. The Old Communists had their term[s]. And the New Communists have their term[s]. The common thread among them is they all have led to the destruction or near destruction of their targets.
Heed the lessons of the past and do not become a part of them.
Post of the day.
Now instead of straw men, go to this actual case. According to a local there are allegations that there has been a campaign of bullying of this black individual, and allegations that there has been vandalism, albeit minor, that are unmentioned in the article, and these allegations do matter. If the threats and vandalism can be traced back to this teen [as opposed to someone else], and if the victim and perp had a falling out and were not friends when this occurred, then it is not a prank but was a form of libel and harassment as well as threats and vandalism, of course. But being that the libel such as it was could not really do damage to the victim's reputation or income there's not much there to go after except for vandalism, IF the teen did it, and terroristic threats, if that is what they were. And if the falling out was not over racial hatred but over a love interest, or some other typical teenage crisis, such as hurt egos, then it's not a 'hate' crime in the spirit of the law even if his choice method of harassment used a stereotype- it's just harassment. Obviously it was not an actual effort to engage in slave trading and shouldn't be prosecuted as if it was. This was minor, not worthy of clogging up the courts [a way to harass the general public]...unless it can be proven the same perp was also a vandal or threat maker, or had assaulted the victim physically.
+1
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